Pulse Diagnosis And The Arab Medical Medical Code "in The Pulse Contrast

The study of the Pulse, or Sphygmology is one of the most important diagnosticmethods in TCM. Unani medicine has developed from The Canon of Medicine, afamous medical encyclopedia compiled by Ibn Sina or Avicenna, and it is regarded asa complementary therapy in the West and as one of the main traditional Medicalsystems in many Islamic countries or regions. In China, many scholars think that thepulse feeling in TCM or Pulse Classic (Mo Jing) affected the theory of the pulse inThe Canon of Medicine by Avicenna. After a long investigation, the original book ofIbn Sina and its two English translations were obtained. From their study, can beconcluded that the sphygmology of Ibn Sina derives from Galen's pulse theory, butthere is lack of evidentiary support that it stems from TCM. The first part of this article mainly discusses the relationship of the sphygmologybetween the two medical Systems, in medical history. The time limitation of this studyis the time prior to the writing and up until the writing of The Canon of Medicine.After a brief introduction of Ibn Sina and his book The Canon of Medicine, as well asthe history of Arabic medicine, it can be deduced that the book's medical theorymainly stems from the Ancient Greek Medical system. From the comparison of thefirst book of The Canon of Medicine and the discussion on the pulse, with the pulsediagnosis written by Galen, it can be said that the sphygmology contained in TheCanon of Medicine is stemming from Galen's theory but not necessarily from TCM orMo Jing. With reference to other Greek doctors' discussion on pulse and theknowledge of ancient Egyptian medicine, an assumption can be made, that the pulsediagnosis in both The Canon of Medicine and TCM have had their own evolutionaryprocess, and may be two independent sphygmology systems. Therefore, even though,the sphygmologies are similar subjects that formed based on the medical practice andobservation of the same phenomenon, (i.e the pulsation of the radial arteries of thehuman body) they had different evolutions, based on the observation by people indifferent regions, with different cultures and philosophical backgrounds. In the second part of this paper, the pulse diagnosis of the two Medical Systemsis compared in detail, in terms of their medical basis, philosophy, conception of pulse,description, classification of the pulse, and effects of different factors on the pulse.Firstly, it is clear that the pulse is a physiological function of the human body.Different medical systems explain the pulse with different cosmologies and differentmethodologies; this can produce different understanding of the essence of the pulsefeeling in the human body. Firstly, this essay will present a brief introduction of thecontent of Mo Jing and The Canon of Medicine Then by comparing the twophilosophical systems, as well as the four element theory and the five phases theory,we can deduce that the Chinese used to observe things in a more dynamic way andthink holistically and synthetically, while ancient Greeks or Ibn Sina used to observethings in a more static way and think analytically and reductively. This is due to thedifferent methodology that resulted from the different ways different people used tostudy the pulse diagnosis in the two Medical systems. After the comparison fromdifferent viewpoints, we can see that Ibn Sina actually described the pulse in a moreanalytical and reductive way through examining the ten objective and physicalfeatures presented in the pulse. On the other hand, the Chinese did not separate pulsesinto many components, but described the twenty-four most commonly seen pulsesvividly and holistically, according to the feeling of the fingers. Therefore each of thetwenty-four pulses may contain more than two components or features, whichindicates that the Chinese people saw things as a whole and did not separate them intodifferent members. Each meridian of human body connects different symptoms alongthe line with a certain viscera, and it has an intimate relationship with the pulsefeeling in TCM. The form...