Traditional Chinese Medicine in Post-Quake Qinghai

Submitted by LaVerne Poussaint


Photo credit: Xinhua, re-produced with expressed permission of the Xinhua News Agency

Dispatched under the State Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine of the People's Republic of China (a bureau under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Health) and in conjunction with the Red Cross Society of China, medical teams were sent by the Public Security Border Troops of the Yunnan Province to provide emergency relief to residents of Qinghai Province who suffer from critical injuries resulting from the recent earthquake. Shown above is a Yunnan TCM medical staffer administering acupuncture to a patient from the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Yushu County (ཡུལ་ཤུལ་་བོད་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་ཁུལ།, 玉树藏族自治州).

These medic troopers rendering care are from one of China's most bio-diversified regions, an environment which supports thousands of species of plants. From among Yunnan's ecological survivors are derived many of the components of TCM pharmaceutical formulae, including Yunnan Baiyao (aka Yunnan Paiyao, 云南白药, 雲南白藥), a haemostatic medicament whose composition is used to (among other things) normalize blood flow, stop hemorrhaging, enhance immune function, improve circulation, promote healing of internal bleeding sustained in injuries, and -in combination with astringent herbs-absorb excessive bleeding.

TCM staffers were deployed as an integrative, interim measure to treat patients in mobile medical units and field hospitals. Those whose critical conditions required more and prolonged intensive care were transported to 38 different medical facilities outside of the quake zone.

TCM as a medical science encompasses a system of practices including (but not limited to) Chinese medication, pharmacology, acupuncture, moxibustion, massage, dietary intervention, Qigong exercises, cupping, and Gua Sha.
TCM's healing approaches for pain, shock, acute DIC, and myocardial infarction; its diagnostic indices, and treatment modalities of acupuncture anaesthesia, acupuncture analgesia have been implemented in other emergency medical events. Particularly efficacious is Tieh Ta (跌打) – a wound and trauma orthopedic discipline for those afflicted with simple and compound bone fractures, sprains, dislocations, and bruises.

Dr. Waseed Saeed (University of Leeds Medical School, UK) has performed surgical relief during post-quake missions in Pakistan, China, Indonesia, and Haiti
http://www.waseemsaeed.com/charity/china-bbc.html. On his Sichuan mission with the same team of doctors and nurses who had served on the Pakistan rota, they encountered a young patient who had endured a guillotine amputation as a result of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. "Her stump had been treated with a traditional herbal remedy, and was showing no signs of infection." He was "astounded by her condition." The "brown material" wrapping that earthquake victim's limb was a TCM non-bacterial herbal compound remedy. Said he, "We have probably got a lot to learn from this type of medicine."

The World Health Organization is of the same mind, having established more than 15 Collaborating Centres (http://www.who.int/collaboratingcentres/networks/networksdetails/en/index2.html) of traditional medicine and pharmacology to aid in the examination of evidence-based, data-driven implementations of indigenous information. Added to that global knowledge-base should be traditional therapies observed being practiced in post-quake Haiti, Chile, and China. Conditions of the planet are impelling nations toward incorporation of TMS logistics framework.


LaVerne Poussaint
Former UNSO/UNDP worker and volunteer with several NGOs, including the ICRC
Email: laverne.poussaint@deepmed.net