Customer Reviews

A Clinical Guide to Chinese Herbs and Formulae, 1e

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Although i am just a beginning student of Chinese Medicine, i really appreciated the clear and concise differentiations made between single herbs
and formulas.
The preface states the book has five parts:
"Part 1 points out similarities and differences between herbs of similar nature or action.
Part 2 describes combinations of two or more herbs that commonly appear as a group within larger formulae
Part 3 analyzes individual herbs according to their actions on the Zang Fu
Part 4 sets forth guiding principles in formulating prescriptions according to the various treatment methods, and compares formulae with in each such category.
Part 5 deals with specific pathological patterns or disease, demonstrating the clinical use of formulae with case histories."
Every group of herbs comes with an illustration of anatomical figures with single herbs placed on the area of the body that it acts upon. There are
also charts of differentiations for single herbs and charts of comparision
of the formulae. As a beginner these were all of a great help to me.

This book provides an excellent adjunct resource to build on core Chinese herbology texts such as the Bensky et al. books or Chen & Chen. However, it will not be a good resource on herbs for people who are looking for an understanding of Chinese herb actions within a Western biomedical framework, and I see that several people who were looking for that panned this text. For Chinese herbs discussed in a pharmological and biomedical framework, as well as in traditional Chinese medical terms, the books by John & Tina Chen will be much more suitable.

For students of Chinese herbology who seek to understand herbs in terms of their effects on Qi, Xue, Jing, etc., this book is great. It provides excellent comparisons to differentiate herbs within categories, as well as discussions of the effects of the flavors, natures, and so forth that are better than those in most other books. It also provides elegant information on topics often missed in formulas classes, such as the potential for causing trapped heat by using heavy bitter and cold herbs without combining them with light acrid herbs to provide an escape route for the heat.

For those reviewers who criticized this book for not providing research data to back up claims about herb actions, I assure you (as a research scientist myself) that there are good reasons why it did not do so, if only because discussing the research support for Chinese herb use could take several volumes in its own right. Chinese medicine has its own framework of vocabulary that sounds extremely bogus to ears not accustomed to it (for example, the common cold is generally referred to as "a wind invasion"). This language makes sense within its own context as a functional model that makes valid predictions and provides guidelines for prescribing herbs even when the biomedical mechanisms of a disease are poorly understood, as with many autoimmune diseases. I admit that it sounds ridiculous when you're not used to it. There are many people in the field who are seeking to understand the correspondences between the traditional terminology and biomedical concepts, but that is not the purpose of this book, and it should not necessarily be criticized for failing to do something that, in my opinion, was never its intention.

The merit of this book is in providing in a central location describing many traditional Chinese herbs and the ailments they claim to treat. Having said this, there is little else of merit. Much of the text describes unsubstantiated claims, at variance with the modern scientific understanding of human biology.

Maybe some of these herbs and treatments have true theraputic value. But the onus of proof is on their proponents. In the entire text, there is NO mention of any tests done to support the claims. Specifically, there is nothing about any double blind tests, which is the gold standard for assessing the merits of a herb or drug.

The most that we get is some anecdotal comments about how such and such a herb produces such and such a purported benefit. A first year medical student could tell you that human responses vary widely between individuals. Some herb which might have a benign effect on one person could have adverse effects on others. That is why drug tests use as many patients as possible, and that is why double blind tests are even better, for a more objective assessment.

The book is written for the scientifically ignorant.

The book is very lacking in any medical rigor. It makes all sorts of impressive claims about the efficacies of various herbs found in China or eastern Asia. Where is the proof? Where are the documented, statistically valid studies? This is completely deficient. Only some of you totally unacquainted with modern medical standards will be satisfied with what the authors say. But to any medical professional who is trained in modern scientific methodology, the so-called 'clinical guide' is a farce.

Ah, and what about the diagrams of herbs next to the parts of the body that they are said to theraputically affect? This is totally medieval [Asian or European].

By the way, don't fall for the claim that just because something is "natural" that therefore it is good for you. The more complex reality is that natural can be good, neutral or bad. For the latter, consider the naturally occurring poisons or poisonous plants and diseases. Nightshade is natural and deadly, for example.

China is trying massively to improve its science and technology and largely succeeding. It needs to leave legacy misbeliefs like this book behind.