So one of the world’s premiere scientific journals considers TCM mambo-jumbo voodooish crap. There has been no ‘flood of cures’. What else would one expect from a knowledge system that is pre-scientific?[/quote]
All that article says is that TCM isn’t quantitative in practise, which I agree. However, I think saying there has been “no flood of cures” is misleading. TCM and herbs used by TCM have contributed to many cures. Artemisinin, a powerful treatment to malaria came from Chinese scientists who derived it from a TCM herb. In fact, another malaria medicine Quenine, came from traditional medicine from South America.
There are more examples of this, for example, horseshoe crab has a long history of being used in TCM, and nowadays its blue blood is wildly used in modern medicine.
What really needs to change is TCM practitioner’s aversion to quantitative studies.
[quote=“joey0825”][color=#008040]I’m sorry, this is too time consuming for me. I’m a little bit tired of saying the same thing again and again. I’m not expecting you to change, but I need to leave this thread and focus on more important things. I’m grateful for all your reply. [/color]I think it’s time for me to stop this kind of 雞同鴨講。
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year![/quote]
Just an FYI.
If anyone wants to know more about TCM or wants to debate about the effectiveness of TCM,[color=#FF0000] I’d love to discuss with you face to face[/color], not on the internet, which I already tried for the past couple of months. Maybe a face to face chat can make my words more clear and focus more on the essential issue we want to discuss. Drop me a line, I will make my best to meet you in person in the evening of weekdays in Taipei.
Thank you! Happy New Year!
As an (ex) doctor, I wouldn’t let anyone do anything to my body where they can’t provide a peer-reviewed evidence base which demonstrates that their proposed treatment regime is effective.
[quote]As the practitioner was pulling acupuncture needles from her feet, she reportedly had a seizure and passed out in the clinic at about 8.46pm.
The clinic called an ambulance but a police spokesman said the woman was dead on arrival at Ruttonjee Hospital in Wan Chai. There was no indication that the treatment and collapse were connected.[/quote]
No indication that the treatment and the collapse were connected. OK, but I bet if the patient recovered from her ailment the acupuncturist would have taken the credit.
I wonder how many times ambulance officers call acupuncturists.
I just wanted to say that I’m a regular user of both western and Chinese medicine. I grew up in the states with four seasons and with a rather dry climate, pretty much an opposite of Taiwan. So, moving here resulted in my allergies becoming worse than normal. After taking Chinese herbal medicine for a few months on a regular basis, my allergies have become better, but not completely cured. Placebo effect? Possibly? I can’t compare this “illness” to western medicine because I never tried western medicine to cure my allergies.
My more extreme case was similar to Formosa Fitness’ where my ankle that I had hurt over 7 years ago somehow reverted and started bothering me again. I tried physical therapy where they just threw a hot pack on it for 20 mins and then hooked me up with a muscle stimulation machine for another 15-20 mins, but none of that was working. I went for acupuncture once a week for a month where the acupuncturist pretty much went at it on my ankle with his elbow for 5-10 mins and after that month, I was cured.
In an opposite case, I hurt my knee half a year back and went to the acupuncturist where he went at my knee with his elbow for 5-10 mins once a week for a month and I saw no improvement from my treatments. I opted for physical therapy where I went 2-4 days a week and they hot packed and did muscle stimulation to my knee. After being off the bike for a month and physical therapy, I can’t say I’m cured and I have zero pain, but physical therapy got me better in a month than what acupuncture did in the same time.
[quote=“hansioux”][quote=“antarcticbeech”]
I wonder how many times ambulance officers call acupuncturists.[/quote]
if acupuncture is just placebo effect, then why would it actually kill someone for having a needle penetrate insignificant areas for only skin deep?[/quote]
I was being facetious, but that is a good question. One could also ask why would it actually work. In either case I would be looking to clinical trials for the answer, not anecdotal evidence.
I don’t think you understand what you posted. Prospero is not an academic journal, merely a database to register prospective reviews. Prospective means future, ie, not finished yet. If you click on your own link and scroll down you will find that the status of the review is ongoing, and if you scroll right down the bottom you’ll find that the data analysis has not started.
Also, that review it is being conducted by a team from the Chengdu university of traditional Chinese medicine. If it gets published it will probably be published in a journal of Chinese medicine, or a journal of acupuncture, not in an actual medical journal.
When I was a medical college freshman learning TCM, I had exactly the same feeling as you.
However, I choose to distinguish those core essence that does benefit our patients from those that make no sense nowadays. When learning Chinese medicine, it is very important to go back to the time when these strange formula was created so that you would understand why our ancestor would use such a strange thing to treat those ailments.
One thing I tried to remind myself is : Don’t ever judge something before you get to see the whole picture of it. I choose not to be trapped in those strange things that I find hard to believe but to focus more on the TCM theories that is useful. I believe doctors have to be very practical. There are millions of formulas recorded in TCM classics, why spend time arguing those ingredients that don’t make sense to me after learning the core theories of TCM?
I think the main difference between TCM and conventional western medicine is the questions they ask. “Does it work?” as opposed to “How does it work?”.
The fact that we don’t know how much of conventional medicine works anyway tends to be ignored.
I love Chinese medicine as a general. Chinese medicine doctors, like that of western doctors, I might not be so complimentary. I really wish I was in Taipei tomorrow,.would like.to join.
One thing I have always justifiably had at odds with Chinese medicine though is the lack of depth in identifying the ingredients in the potions and powders. And I’m a great follower. But being a biologist at heart I can’t accept their lack of knowledge on their sources. And I am quite involved in the farming, production and import/sales of TCM herbs. I get they can have a system.of identifying lingzhi based on conk color and shape, but virtually no energy goes into seeing host species unless its really expensive, like bull camphor slime. a very unprofessional profession I seriously hope we can all work on improving. Western medicine I could say the same, but I’m involved in biological Medicine, so can’t speak much.
Do you guys ever discuss the actual ingredients, on an identifiable level with these? There are numerous species of ginseng, goji, lingzhi and all number of herbs and from what I’ve seen no doctor can say which they have. In fact half the time I’m.thrown out of the office for asking what they are giving me. Other times they become my customer :), and I genuinely like their practice… so curious if see any room for improvement on 2 fronts:
Doctors maturity levels and the ability to interact with patients rather than just be an egotistical.teacher.
Step up the education on the frontlines of proper identification and growing/harvest practices of what the tcm profession sells.
Is there interest in improving these issues in your opinion?
We don’t know the mechanisms behind TCM yet, but then we didn’t know why people under 25 drove recklessly before insurance recognized that emprically and started charging them higher rates. Now we know the neural mechanisms.
OK, but I bet if the patient recovered from her ailment the acupuncturist would have taken the credit.