By Caroline Wolcott, Lena Dufresne, Anna Walters, and Graham Robbins
Contaminated baby formula, water contaminated by sewage, and unsafe swimming conditions are frightening realities in China. These issues span over numerous aspects of everyday life including people’s eating habits, health, and lifestyle. A large percentage of this contamination can be attributed to many years of uncontrolled industrial pollution, seeing as though industry is a large majority of the Chinese economy.
A woman overlooks the polluted Yangtze River. Courtesy: Getty Images
This blog entry is written from the perspective of an old woman who is witnessing the changes occurring in the Chinese healthcare system as modern medicine is taking over the traditional.
Back when I was a young girl, doctors in my town used traditional medicines that have been passed down for generations, such as herbs and acupuncture. Today, there are some doctors who still choose to use medical care based on Traditional Chinese Medicine, like in the past, and others choose to use a more modern method. I have even seen traditional treatments like acupuncture and homeopathy used alongside modern practices and medications. I have witnessed Traditional Chinese Medicine treat all kinds of illnesses: mental, physical, and emotional. The old ways work so well because they address the source of balance within the body, or qi. When the qi is unstable, we become sick, and traditional medicines can return our qi to normal. These long-established remedies can be individualized to fit each patient, and therefore make the treatment more effective. I have heard stories of people who have been cured of pain and had their urge to smoke cigarettes cease after receiving acupuncture sessions. There was even one miraculous story of the traditional working alongside modern treatments. A woman was able to undergo open-heart surgery with very little pain as a result of acupuncture that was used during the procedure. As much as I believe that the old way is the best way to treat the entire body, I can see there is no way to slow modern medicine from creeping into our society.
Even with these breakthroughs in modern treatment, many of us in the countryside struggle to have any access to healthcare. In the past, the Ministry of Health has tried to bring in private investors to help poorly performing public hospitals, but even with the change in ownership, the hospitals continued to reflect poor management. Places like Hong Kong, Japan, and Taiwan, as well as America, Southeast Asia, and Europe are looking to put investments into Chinese healthcare, but I don’t see how they could understand the traditions in medicine that we have used for our whole lives. I worry that they will try to replace hundreds of years of our heritage with machines and computers. I know that these foreigners would let us be able to have more access to modern medicines, but I worry that they will take away what is rooted in the past.
If you want to learn more about acupuncture check out this video about acupuncturists in Shanghai:
Fontes, Mario, and Stephanie Pina. “Homeopathy and Chinese Medicine: Uniting Two Forms of Energetic Medicine.” Townsend Letter. February/March 2009. 79-82.
Shobert, Benjamin, and Sandra Ward. “China’s Healthcare Reforms: Addressing Discontent while Creating a Consumer Economy.” The National Bureau of Asian Research, March 7, 2013.
What’s the first thing that pops into your head when you hear the words “Chinese medicine”?
Let me guess: an image of an old man sticking needles into a patient’s back, in a run-down, family-owned and operated business. Or maybe an understaffed, frenzied Beijing hospital without the resources to provide healthcare for the masses flooding in.
But the way the PRC operates, not just with regards to healthcare but also in its approach to other aspects of Chinese life, is much more intricate and sophisticated than the China stereotypes suggest.
Outpatient prescription lines; photo from capl@washjeff.edu
There are two main influences on today’s system: traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) theory, as well as the same modern healthcare we are so fortunate to have access to in the States. TCM is different from scientific medicine in that it’s based on Asian concepts, such as the yin yang symbol we’re all familiar with, which are tied to the way that Chinese view healthcare and the human body.
Yin yang symbol; photo from DonkeyHotey on flickr
Yin and yang are natural opposites, according to TCM, that help balance different aspects of one’s body energy, or qi (pronounced “chee”). And keeping track of qi is the crux of TCM. In fact, the focus of acupuncture is to shuffle the flow of qi along channels in the body (these channels look similar to the central nervous system, but are unrelated) in order to improve the patient’s overall health. But although acupuncture is the most recognized form of TCM in the West, it’s only one of many important practices.
If you’re a patient in the present-day PRC looking for a tried-and-true traditional medicine, you’ll have to start by boiling a pot of water. As accustomed as Americans are to drinking iced water, the Chinese like it hot, and there’s a cultural reason why: traditional medicine is usually administered as a package of herbs that the patient takes home, boils, and drinks. From what I’ve heard, they taste disgusting, but are still preferable to the more “unique” ingredients, like bear bile.
Chinese herbal medicines and teas; photo from MookieLuv on flickr
And while, in theory, the herb treatments are as effective as our pill-popping, the Chinese take holistic medicine to another level. TCM encourages healthy eating according to yin and yang, exercising to help qi flow (ever seen people gathering to do tai-chi early in the morning outside city parks?), and managing one’s lifestyle and body health by the balance of the five elements (metal, water, earth, wood, and fire).
But modern healthcare is slowly marginalizing TCM theory, because of its scientific basis. Patients will often use both methods, ignoring the drastic theoretical differences. There was never a systematic approach for treating TCM patients, anyways. You want chemotherapy? If you’ve got the cash, then you’ve got the treatment. Herbs more your style? No questions asked.
It’s almost impossible to define what Chinese medicine today really is, because there are both rural and outer-city clinics with bare-bones setups and metropolitan meccas of scientific research. It’s a disorganized system of patient-led medical practice that seems to just “go with the flow”.
Two medicines must be better than one, right?
Because that seems to be the idea the Chinese have adopted.
A woman overlooks the polluted Yangtze River. Courtesy: Getty Images
