Tibetan Medicine

Brief Introduction to Tibetan Medicine
As part of Chinese medicine, Tibetan medicine is gradually formed. It prevails in places where the Tibetan people live, such as Tibet, Qinghai, Sichuan, and Gansu provinces in China. In India and Nepal in south Asia, it is also a major kind of medicine.

The Tibetan medicine originated in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in south-west China. It manifests the special feature in that region. The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is located in a frigid zone. The poor transportation makes it difficult to connect with the outside world, thus retaining its feature. Since there is small variety of plants and animals living in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, most of the sources for the Tibetan medicine are from the cold resistant plants and animals. These plants and animals live in the high mountains where there is lack of oxygen.

Basic Theory of Tibetan Medicine
The Tibetan medicine has formed its own characteristic in the long process.

The theory of San Yin
According to Tibetan theory, there are three factors in human body, which are "long", "chi ba" and "pei gen". There are seven kinds of substances in human body, the essence of food, blood, flesh, fat, bone, etc. There are three kinds of excreta, urine, feces, and sweat. The three factors decide the changes of the seven substances and three excreta. In normal cases, they co-exist with each other and live in a balancing way. When one or more factors over react or diminish, the body will have disease in "long", "chi ba" and "pei gen". Therefore the patients need to be treated in the above three aspects to return to normal.

The concept of "long" refers to the power of movement. It is similar to the "feng" and "qi" in the traditional Han medicine, yet it is a broader idea than that. "chi ba" is translated as "dan" or "huo", similar to the "hotness" in Han medicine. The main features of "chi ba" is to maintain the normal temperature in the body, keep stomach functioning, etc. "pei gen" is something like saliva but more than that. It is related to all the liquidation inside the human body.

In Tibetan theory, disease occurs because the "long", "chi ba" and "pei gen" are not in balance, thus affecting the health of the body. So the aim of treatment is to make them in harmony again if they are overreacting or diminishing.

Human Anthropotomy and Physiology
Tibetans have a deep understanding of human anthropotomy and physiology. In Tibetan medicine, human body is believed to have internal organs consisting of the heart, liver, spleen, lungs, and kidneys as well as stomach, gall, three visceral cavities, small and large intestines, and bladder. In ancient time, the Tibetan doctors used the relation of feudal monarchy as a metaphor to describe the function of the internal organs. For example, the heart was like a king sitting in the middle; the lung acted something like a minister, liver and spleen was sort of imperial concubine, and kidney was similar to the backbone, etc.

This showed that ancient Tibetan doctors had some knowledge of the human body.

Special Treatments of Tibetan Medicine

Emetic Measures
By emetic measures, patients are expected to take some medicine to induce vomit. The method can be used when there is too much food, or there is something wrong or poisonous in the stomach. As for contraindication, the elderly, the week, the pregnant, the children are not suitable for this method. If the poison is taken for too long, this method doesn't work either since the substance is supposed to get out of the body.

Medicated Bath
The medicated bath in Tibetan medicine has its special feature. Springs are often applied in this treatment, such as sulphur spring, aluminite spring, spring of dried dung of Trogopterus xanthipes, limestone spring, etc.

There are two kinds of medicated bath, water or medicine compress. For water bath, the above mentioned springs are suitable to treat the so called "hotness" either in the muscle or in the bone. The medicine compress treatment means packing the medicine ingredients, either compounded, cooked or boiled, into the bag before putting it on the diseased part of the body.

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