Malaria

A recurrent disease characterized by shivering, vigorous heat [effusion], and sweating and classically attributed to contraction of summerheat during the hot season, contact with mountain forest miasma, or contraction of cold-damp. Malaria is explained as evil qì latent at midstage (half exterior and half interior). Different forms are distinguished according to signs and causes.

Malaria

Types distinguished by cause and pattern

• Wind malaria: heat effusion and spontaneous sweating
• Summerheat malaria: vigorous heat [effusion], vexation and thirst
• Damp malaria: oppression in the chest, upflow nausea, and aching and heaviness in the trunk and limbs
• Cold malaria: severe aversion to cold followed by mild heat effusion
• Warm malaria: pronounced heat effusion followed by mild aversion to cold
• Pure-heat malaria: heat effusion without aversion to cold
• Female malaria: aversion to cold without heat effusion
• Phlegm malaria: dizziness, copious phlegm, and coma

Types Distinguished by Time of Episode

• Tertian malaria: attacks every third day
• Quartan malaria: every fourth day
• See also triple-yīn malaria.
• Enduring malaria: vacuity signs

Types Distinguished by the Triggering Cause

• Taxation malaria: caused by irregularities of work and rest
• Food malaria: dietary irregularities
• Miasmic malaria: caused by miasma
• Epidemic malaria: epidemic qì

Medicinal therapy: The principle of treatment for malaria is as follows:

1. Initial stage: harmonization.
2. Middle stage: interrupting malaria (using medicinals or acupuncture to prevent imminent episodes).
3. Advanced stage: supplementing vacuity.

Acumoxatherapy: General malaria-terminating treatment is based mainly on GV, PC, and SI. Select GV-14 (Great Hammer, 大椎 dà zhuī), GV-13 (Kiln Path, 陶道 táo dào), PC-5 (Intermediary Courier, 间使 jiān shǐ), and SI-3 (Back Ravine, 后溪 hòu xī); needle with drainage 2–3 hours before an expected episode. If episodes are not regular, needle 2–3 times a day.

Point selection according to signs: For pronounced heat, add LI-11 (Pool at the Bend, 曲池 qū chí) and TB-1 (Passage Hub, 关冲 guān chōng). For high fever and clouded spirit, also prick Ten Diffusing Points (十宣 shí xuān) to bleed. For alternating heat and cold, add GV-13 (Kiln Path, 陶道 táo dào) and Lofty Bone (崇骨 chóng gǔ). For enduring malaria, add moxa at BL-20 (Spleen Transport, 脾俞 pí shù) and GV-9 (Extremity of Yáng, 至阳 zhì yáng). For mother-of-malaria (palpable lump), add LR-13 (Camphorwood Gate, 章门 zhāng mén), Glomus Root (痞根 pǐ gēn), BL-18 (Liver Transport, 肝俞 gān shù), and BL-20 (Spleen Transport, 脾俞 pí shù).

Etymology

Chin 虐 nüè, 疒 sickness, combined with 虐 nüè, torment. A disease that continually torments the patient with repeated heat effusion and aversion to cold.