What is Traditional Chinese Medicine

Traditional Chinese Medicine or TCM for short, is a coherent and independent system of medical thought and practice that utilizes the techniques of acupuncture, moxibustion, nutrition, herbs, exercise and massage in its therapy.

It has evolved over thousands of years and because TCM is rooted in a philosophy and culture entirely foreign to the West it has developed it's own unique perception and language concerning the body and disease.

Ancient Chinese healers studied the external rhyme and season of nature and applied those laws and language in their observations of human bodily functions. Wind, heat, cold, fire, dryness and damp are words that apply not only to nature but to the body. For example in TCM an acute sore throat is not considered a viral infection but rather an attack of wind heat.

This uniqueness does not make Chinese medicine primitive or magical. Nor does it make the mystical and ultimate truth. It simply means that TCM is a complete, though different system than Western medicine.