A Study On The Common Cold Based On Ancient Literature

Cold is a common disease characterized by clinical symptoms such as nasal obstruction,runny nose,sneezing,coughing,headache,aversion to cold along with fever,and general malaise.It is generally divided into the common cold and influenza.Modern scholars have studied much more about the influenza than the common cold,especially the study of ancient literature on the common cold is extremely less.Based on the comprehensive collection of cold related data in ancient literature from pre-qin to late qing dynasty,this study systematically sorted out the collected data,and took the dynasties as the basic context to clarify the disease name,etiology,pathogenesis and treatment of cold.Then,through the preliminary statistics of the ancient prescriptions,the law of cold treatment and medication was revealed to a certain degree,while the conclusion of the ancient literature research was mutually verified.Finally,process of the development of common cold and the related problems in modern cognition are discussed.This paper mainly includes five parts.The first part is to discuss the definition and research scope of the disease.This paper mainly studies cold,while other TCM diseases related to cold,such as cough,are not included in this study.The second part is mainly about the review and research of ancient literature on the disease name,etiology,pathogenesis and treatment.The study dates the first book on colds back to before 1098,and"Gan mao"and"Shang feng"are the main names of cold.The exogenous pathogenesis of the disease is wind chill.On the other hand,the internal pathogenesis involves organs such as lung,spleen,kidney along with qi,blood,Yin and Yang and other aspects.In the last analysis,the etiology pathogenesis is the Ying-wei does not solidify while the body feeling wind chill.The basic method to cure the disease is sweating therapy,such as relieving exterior syndrome with pungent and warm or cool natured herbs,evacuating exterior syndrome to unblock Qi.The third part is statistical studies on the usage frequency of the drugs in the prescriptions in ancient literature,analyzing the distribution characteristics of four properties and five tastes and channel tropism of the most used drugs.The results shows that the main prescription for cold in ancient times mostly includes drugs for relieving exterior syndrome.These drugs with nearly common properties and flavors are hot,sweet,warm and the also share the same meridian tropism,which is Lung Meridian.The results are consistent with the theory of the basic etiology,pathogenesis and treatment of common cold in ancient literature.The fourth part is the discussion of cold related problems.The first is to discuss the connotation of common cold syndrome,which is much more extended than that of ancient literature.Secondly,the relationship between cold plague and cold is discussed,preliminarily combing out the development of cold plague.The fifth part makes a summary of the whole paper,pointing out the innovation and deficiency of this research,and also puts forward the prospect of future research as well.