Open Access Emergency Medicine (Apr 2020)
Traditional Chinese Medicine in Emergency Treatment Mechanism and Application
Abstract
Yu Meng,1 Toby M Michelena,1 Fangfang Cai,2 Xinfa Lou,3 Shasha Li,4,5 Ruifeng Zhang6 1College of Science and Technology, Wenzhou-Kean University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325060, People’s Republic of China; 2Health Service Center, Wenzhou-Kean University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325060, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Anatomy, Wenzhou Medical University, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325035, People’s Republic of China; 4Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Department of Radiology, Massachusetts General Hospital, Charlestown, MA 02129, United States; 5Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA 02115, United States; 6Department of Rehabilitation, Wenzhou Medical University Second Affiliated Hospital, Wenzhou, Zhejiang 325027, People’s Republic of ChinaCorrespondence: Ruifeng Zhang Email [email protected]: Traditional Chinese medicine has usually been recognized to be efficacious to treat chronic diseases from the western point-of-view. However, there is a long history in China of applying traditional Chinese medicine in many acute and urgent medical conditions. In this review, selected methods documented in traditional Chinese medicine including blowing air to ear, nose insufflating therapy, acupuncture and moxibustion were presented as the common practices to promote consciousness recovery from coma. We aimed to explore the mechanism of these four methods with current scientific evidence, further discuss the potential of traditional Chinese medicine to be applied in emergency medicine and provide a path forward to more rigorously validate these procedures. The development of the integrated traditional Chinese medicine and western medicines provides a new therapeutic direction for the new first-aid treatment.Keywords: traditional Chinese medicine, first-aid, ear blowing, nose insufflating therapy, acupuncture, moxibustion
