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Diseases 5, abdomen
疾病5，腹部 〔疾病5，腹部〕jí bìng 5, tóu jǐng fù bù
Food damage (伤食 shāng shí): A condition due to unclean food or excessive amounts of food marked by aversion to food, nausea and vomiting, belching, putrid-smelling vomitus and qì, acid swallowing, painful bloating of the abdomen, diarrhea or constipation, foul-smelling stool and flatus, and relief from pain and distension after defecation or passing of flatus. The tongue fur is slimy and either thick or yellow. In food damage, when food accumulation remains untransformed for days, the resulting condition is called abiding food As a modern pattern, it is often referred to as
Gān accumulation (疳积 gān jī): Also called gān disease
(疳疾 gān jí, 疳病 gān bìng). Often translated as
A disease of infancy or childhood marked by emaciation, dry hair, heat effusion, abdominal distension with visible superficial veins, yellow facial complexion, and loss of essence-spirit vitality. It arises when dietary factors, evils, or worms damage the spleen and stomach. Note that the term gān,
often simply translated as malnutrition,
appears in terms denoting ulcerative conditions associated malnutrition (e.g., eye gān) or unassociated with malnutrition (e.g., lower-body gān). Because the term疳 gān is also used in the names of ulcerative conditions such as gān of the eye
and gān of the teeth and gums,
the original meaning is unclear, so we adopt the transcription as the English translation.
Worm accumulation (虫积 chóng jī): Also called worm patterns
(虫证 chóng zhèng). Disease patterns caused by worms (intestinal parasites). Traditionally, worms were diagnosed symptomatically on the basis of clamoring stomach, intermittent abdominal pain, desire for strange foods, passing of worms in the stool, vomiting of worms, yellow face, emaciation, grinding of the teeth in sleep, itchy nose, white patches on the face, and blue patches on the whites of the eyes (sclera). Sometimes there are sudden episodes of abdominal pain with a palpable rope-like mass in the abdomen. Severe pain may be accompanied by reversal cold of the limbs.
Stomach reflux (反胃 fǎn wèi): A disease characterized by vomiting in the evening of food ingested the previous morning or vomiting in the morning of food ingested the previous evening. It is mostly attributable to spleen-stomach vacuity cold (spleen or stomach yáng vacuity), spleen-kidney yáng vacuity, or dual vacuity of qì and yīn.
Jaundice (黄疸 huáng dǎn): Jaundice is a disease characterized by generalized yellowing of the skin and whites of the eyes. It arises when contraction of external evils or dietary irregularities cause damage to the spleen and stomach that gives rise to damp evil. The damp evil obstructs the center burner and affects the liver and gallbladder (congested earth rebelling against wood
). This causes the bile to deviate from its normal path and spill into the blood, and from the blood into the skin. Jaundice can take the form of yīn yellowing
(also called yīn jaundice
) or yáng yellowing
(also called yáng jaundice
), depending on whether the dampness forms with cold or with heat.
See also the following:
- Acute jaundice
- Blood amassment yellowing
- Black jaundice
- Damp-heat jaundice
- Female taxation jaundice
- Five jaundices
- Gallbladder jaundice
- Grain jaundice
- Liquor jaundice
- Scourge jaundice
- Vacuity jaundice
Yáng jaundice - Yellow sweat
- Yīn jaundice
Drum distension (鼓胀, 臌胀 gǔ zhàng): In older texts, also referred to as water gǔ
(水蛊 shuǐ gǔ), water distension
(水胀 shuǐ zhàng), and other names. Severe abdominal distension, often associated with a somber-yellow coloration of the skin, and The Origin and Indicators of Disease
), now understood as blood fluke infestation). Drum distension can manifest in dampness, damp-heat, qì stagnation, spleen vacuity, or kidney vacuity. Severe forms forming repletion patterns are often treated with drastic water-expelling medicinals.
Concretions, conglomerations, accumulations, and gatherings (癥瘕积聚 zhēng jiǎ jī jù): Four kinds of abdominal mass associated with distension and pain.
- Concretions and accumulations are masses of definite form and fixed location, associated with pain of fixed location. They are associated with disease of the viscera and the blood (blood stasis).
- Conglomerations and gatherings are masses of indefinite form that gather and disperse at irregular intervals and attended by pain of unfixed location. They are associated with disease of the bowels and of qì (qì stagnation).
Accumulations and gatherings occur in the center burner; concretions and conglomerations occur in the lower burner and many gynecological diseases.
See also the following:
Strings and aggregations (痃癖 xián pǐ): A term found in older texts. Strings
are elongated masses located at the side of the umbilicus; aggregations
are masses located in the rib-side that occur intermittently with pain and that are indetectable by palpation at other times. The two conditions belong to the category of concretions, conglomerations, accumulations, and gatherings
(notably conglomerations and gatherings). Both are caused by dietary irregularities damaging the spleen and stomach, the gathering and binding of cold and phlegm, and congealing stagnation of qì and blood. They are often associated with emaciation, reduced eating, and fatigue.
Phlegm aggregation (痰癖 tán pǐ): A term found in older texts, denoting enduring water-rheum transforming into phlegm that flows into the rib-side, causing periodic pain. Note that aggregation
simply refers to an intermittent diffuse mass.
Mounting (疝 shàn): Also called mounding.
Any of various diseases marked by pain in the abdomen and pain in the external genitalia. In men, it includes painful swelling of the scrotum (called mounting qì
or foxlike mounting
), attributable to the protrusion of the intestines into the scrotum or to swelling of the testicles.
See also the following:
- Downfall mounting
- Blood mounting
- Cold mounting
- Foxlike mounting
- Slumping mounting
Qì mounting - Sinew mounting
- Water mounting
Mounting-conglomeration (疝瘕 shàn jiǎ): A term found in older texts denoting an abdominal mass that moves under pressure and is associated with abdominal pain stretching into the lumbus and back. It is attributed to wind-cold binding with qì and blood in the abdomen, ultimately stemming from dietary irregularities and excessive cold or cold in the environment or from inappropriate clothing.
Intestinal welling-abscess (肠痈 cháng yōng): A welling-abscess forming in the intestines. It is attributed to blood stasis stemming from either damp-heat or stagnation of qì and blood. Static blood obstructs the flow of qì and blood depriving the intestine of nourishment and thereby causing putrefaction. Intestinal welling-abscess is marked by pain in the smaller abdomen that refuses pressure. It corresponds in biomedicine to appendicitis, periappendicular abscess, and other suppurative abdominal lesions.
Cholera (霍乱 huò luàn): Also called sudden turmoil.
A disease characterized by simultaneous vomiting and diarrhea, abdominal pain, and often followed by severe painful cramping of the calves. It is caused by contraction of dampness or by unclean food. It most commonly presents as damp-heat or cold-damp. It corresponds to cholera, paracholera, acute gastroenteritis, and bacterial food poisoning in biomedicine. Because the Chinese medical concept is wider than biomedical understanding of cholera, which is specifically a disease caused by Vibrio cholerae, many prefer to call it sudden turmoil,
which is what the Chinese term means.
- Cold cholera : Simultaneous vomiting and diarrhea with stool and vomitus that has no pronounced odor and that is like water or the water in which rice has been washed. There may be abdominal pain, cold limbs, green-blue or purple lips and nails, and a pulse that is sunken and hidden. It is attributed to consumption of raw or cold foods or to external contraction of cold-damp.
- Heat cholera : Simultaneous vomiting and diarrhea with foul-smelling stool and vomitus, abdominal pain, and painful cramping of the calves. It is caused by dietary irregularities, summerheat or damp-heat.
See also the following:
Dysentery (痢疾 lì jí): A disease characterized by tenesmus (urgency to defecate and straining) with blood and pus in the stool. Dysentery usually occurs in hot weather and arises when spleen vacuity and eating raw, cold, or unclean food allow damp-heat to arise and pour down to the intestines. When blood and pus (actually mucus) are equally prominent, it is called red and white dysentery.
When blood is prominent, it is called red dysentery
or blood dysentery,
while when pus
is prominent, it is called white dysentery.
In the advanced stages, it may turn into a vacuity pattern characterized by fatigue and milder abdominal pain. This is called vacuity dysentery.
See also the following:
Intestinal wind (肠风 cháng fēng): This term refers to two specific conditions.
- A disease marked by the passage of bright-red blood before stool (proximal bleeding), without pain or swelling of the anus and with a red tongue and rapid pulse. It is attributed to wind-heat or damp-heat in the stomach and intestines, in some cases complicated by dampness.
- Internal hemorrhoids (poorly distinguishable from the first definition by traditional diagnostic techniques).
Intestinal afflux (肠澼 cháng pì): A term seen in older texts denoting (1) dysentery or (2) bloody stool due to intestinal stasis.
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