Customer Reviews

Fundamentals of Chinese Medicine

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one of the better introductory texts to the study of Chinese medical theory. What it has and others lack are helpful footnotes along the way to solidify the many, often confusing and sometime non-discernable, concepts in Chinese medicine. In addition, readers are eased into the basics of Chinese materia medica by having such information intertwined within the theoretical discourse. A real gem.

I've always thought this is a great textbook on basic Chinese medicine. I wish more schools used it as their basic introductory text. The material is authoritative and the terminology is accurate. I think you get a lot of value for your money with this book. I far prefer it to Giovanni Maciocia's Foundations book. This book could solve a lot of the problems in the TCM schools in North America.

This book is like a complete textbook on Chinese Medicine. It goes over all the fundamental theories in great depth and detail. Beginning with the Yin-Yang theories and going through the Five Phases, 8 principles, and everything else, this book provides all the necessary information. It does read like a textbook, but only because it IS a textbook! I am not enrolled in a school of Oriental medicine, but I bought this book and I LOVE it. It was inexpensive for its size and the amount of information it provides. I am able to read it even though I have not had any formal training in TCM, yet I think experienced students and even practitioners will find this book useful and complete.
An essential must for any TCM library!

This book is a required text for my "Fundamentals of Chinese Medicine" class which is part of a Master's Degree Program in Acupuncture, at Pacific College of Oriental Medicine. The book is very good, but it's not easy to read. It is densely packed with information. You really have to sit and think about each paragraph and consider the meanings implied. There are substantial footnotes at the bottom of almost every page which does help one decipher the text. Good luck to all taking on the challenge of learning Chinese Medicine!

This is a great book for current practitioners and students of Chinese Medicine, regardless if your dicipline is herbal, acupuncture, or both. It's main approach is 8 principle, but those of the 5 element philosphy can gain from it also. The lay person may have a difficult time understanding without being familiar with the general philosphy of Chinese Medicine.

I like the book, but the translation seems confusing at times. For example, on p. 29: "The channels and network vessels include the channel vessels and the network vessels." What does this mean, exactly? Grammatically, the sentence says only that "channels" include "channel vessels" (since network vessels obviously include network vessels -- the sentence is redundant.) Also, grammatically, "channel vessels" should be a kind of vessel, related to channels (as opposed to networks). To make things more confusing, a few lines later, we get: "There are two types of channel vessels: the twelve channels and the eight extraordinary vessels." This sentence says that a "channel" is a type of "channel vessel", which seems to contradict the earlier sentence (which said that a "channel vessel" was a type of channel), as well as the notion that a "channel vessel" is a type of vessel. As a software engineer experienced in object-oriented analysis, I'm frustrated that I'm completely unable to determine the relationship between "channels", "channel vessels", "network vessels", "extraordinary vessels", and "vessels".