A Comparative Study On The Rule Of Differentiation And Treatment Of Diarrhea In "Treatise On Febrile Diseases" And "Traditional Chinese Medicine"

ObjectiveIn this paper,the relationships are explored between the diarrhea called in Chinese Internal Medicine and the dysentery and diarrhea appeared in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease by making comparisons from the aspects of name of disease,etiology,pathogenesis,treating principles and prescriptions,providing the basis for the syndrome differentiation and treatment of diarrhea and tapping the laws ofsyndrome differentiation and treatment of diarrhea in depth.MethodsBy using the inductive method,comparative method and other literature research methods,the related prescriptions and syndromes about dysentery and diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease are hackled;summaries and comparisons are made from the name of disease,etiology,pathogenesis,treating principles and prescriptions of dysentery and diarrhea in both Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease and Chinese Internal Medicine in order to explore the latter’s inheritance and development of the former on diarrhea.ResultsBy comparison,the results were obtained as follows:① On the name of disease,in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease diarrhea includes both diarrhea and dysentery while in Chinese Internal Medicine diarrhea and dysentery are talked about separately,which means improvement and benefits the better mastery of the laws of this kind of disease.②On etiology,external evils,diet,weakness of spleen and stomach functions and depression of kidney yang are discussed in either of above mentioned two books but the cognizance of external evils is not consistent,such as Chinese Internal Medicine emphasizes the dampness evil while Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease the cold and heat evils.In addition,there are some different causes,such as emotional disorders,although first written in the Internal Canon of Medicine,no relevant records in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease and Chinese Internal Medicine inherited the view after generations of development;another example about etiology is water retention and purgative errors,there being quite detailed statements in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease but no mention in Chinese Internal Medicine.③On pathogenesis,Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease contains the contents of Chinese Internal Medicine.One exception is the cold-dampness diarrhea syndrome.The former book involved it,but the specific analysis is not the same as that in the latter book.The explanation about cold-dampness in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease is due to spleen yang deficiency,causing cold and producing dampness with being unable to transform the water and cereal essence,with yang deficiency as a root cause and cold-dampness as an outside appearance.In Chinese Internal Medicine,the cold dampness diarrhea is mainly caused by dampness evil,or dampness mixed with external cold and or abundant dampness with little cold,showing a different analysis compared with that in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease.Apart from that,Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease has a lot of pathogenesises about diarrhea which are not involved in Chinese Internal Medicine such as the same occurrence of illness in both exterior and interior of the body,causing pyretic dysentery;kidney water deficiency,causing fire-hyperactivity which will force Jin liquid to drain downward;the combination of excessiveness in the bowels and dryness-heat,leading to diarrhea with retention;the same occurrence of Shaoyang and Yangming diseases,with a result of gallbladder heat transmitting to the stomach and forcing liquid to drain downward and so on.④On the treating principles,both Chinese Internal Medicine and Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease contain sweat,harmonization,reinforcing method,heat-clearing method,warming method,elimination,purgative method,astringing method as basic treating methods.The treating principles about diarrhea in Chinese Internal Medicine do not go beyond the range of that in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease.Except that the astringing method is consistent,however,the concrete therapeutic methods are not all the same.Chinese Internal Medicine makes some progress based on the treatments of diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease,but still has some imperfections.⑤On the prescription,part prescriptions in Chinese Internal Medicine are the same as prescriptions treating diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease such as decoction of red halloysite and limonite,pink decoction,chebulagic powder,gegen qinlian decoction,lizhong decoction,wuling powder,wumei pill and so on;Chinese Internal Medicine has some prescriptions treating diarrhea which own the similar indications to part prescriptions in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease such as huoxiangzhengqi powder and pueraria decoction,sishen pill and decoctions with the similar functions to sini decoction,tongxieyao formula and sini powder,baohe pill and dachengqi decoction,weiling decoction and wuling powder,etc.There are also some prescriptions treating diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease which are not chosen by Chinese Internal Medicine.As for the drugs,on the one hand,Chinese Internal Medicine sets the addition and subtraction changes in drugs under each prescription,with various kinds and large numbers,and the drugs used are not limited to treating diarrhea;on the other hand,different prescriptions are selected according to the particular treating principles and different drugs are selected according to the particular prescriptions and so the drugs used change with the changes of treating principles and prescriptions.Because the treating principles and prescriptions have been compared,there are no comparisons in drugs.ConclusionsBy the comparison about diarrhea in both Chinese Internal Medicine and Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease from aspects of disease name,etiology,pathogenesis,treating principles,prescriptions and so on,we believe that Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease laid the foundation for the treatment and syndrome differentiation of diarrhea.The diarrhea in Chinese Internal Medicine is developed on the basis of dysentery and diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease but with no full inheritance,so the diarrhea in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Disease remains to be further excavated.Such a deep digging is helpful to improve and complete the regularities of syndrome differentiation of diarrhea,providing a theoretical basis for clinical practice.