![]()
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
Cancer is a complex family of diseases. In recent decades, rapid advances in the introduction of new drugs, surgical interventions and other therapeutic methods have been made by modern medicine in the treatment of cancers. Many early-stage cancers can now be cured and life can be prolonged for late-stage cancers with these new methods.
Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) does not in general offer treatment of cancers with a view to the complete elimination of disease. Rather, it directs itself to helping the body to strengthen and balance itself to give the patient the best chance of overcoming or living with the disease. After patients have undergone chemotherapy, radiotherapy and/or surgery, TCM can often help fortify the patient against the side effects of these therapies, or repair the immune system that has been affected by the toxicity of certain drugs used in chemotherapy. In some instances, with the consent of the Western oncologist treating the patient, TCM herbs can be used concurrently with chemotherapy and radiotherapy to help the patient cope with the side effects of those treatments.
Professor Yu Rencun was trained in Western medicine with specialization in oncology. Through his study of Chinese medicine and his clinical work, mostly at the Beijing Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine where Western and Chinese methods are used together for a whole range of illnesses, he has gathered a wealth of experience using Chinese herbal medicine as a complementary treatment for patients who have undergone Western medical therapies.
In recent years he has spent a considerable amount of time treating patients in various parts of Asia, in particular Singapore which he visits regularly as a clinical consultant. He has written over 20 books on cancer and related subjects. This book, the first of his works to be written in English, captures the essence of the methods that he has used and documents a number of typical cases in which herbal medicine is used to manage cancer patients to improve their quality of life and, in some instances, to prolong their lives.
It is my privilege to have been acquainted with Professor Yu for over 20 years and observed many of the cases satisfactorily treated by him. I was therefore pleased that he asked me to collaborate with him in writing this book in English in order that his vast experience and deep insights into the role that TCM can play in cancer management be recorded for an English-speaking audience. This audience would include not only medical professionals but also patients and their relatives who can benefit from better understanding the conditions of the patients and appreciating how TCM could help in the management of these conditions.
The book would also be useful to the general reader who wishes to know how TCM works and how it can be applied to cultivating health and keeping his body in good condition to prevent this and other similar diseases.
Chapter 2 gives an outline of the concepts and principles in TCM. This is essential reading for those who are not trained in TCM or familiar with its main body of theory. The next chapter introduces the reader to Chinese herbs and how they are combined for therapeutic and health promotion purposes.
Chapter 4 describes how TCM looks at cancer as a disease and the principles employed in therapy. It draws heavily on Professor Yu’s scholarly writings. As it attempts to present the subject in a manner to which a Western-educated readership can more easily relate, this and subsequent chapters do not attempt a literal translation of any part or parts of Professor Yu’s earlier works, and may not always conform to the standard terminology used in English translations of TCM textbooks. (It should be noted, though, that there is as yet no universally accepted standard terminology for translating TCM, this being a subject of continuing discussion and debate in academic and regulatory circles.)
Where I have occasionally taken the liberty to use more appropriate terms to help the reader understand the concepts, I make no apologies for doing so as our aim is to help the reader gain an understanding of the ideas and principles involved rather than to provide a reference text for medical professionals and students. For example, “dysphoria” is the technical term used to translate “
xinfan” (
), “a sensation of stuffiness with heat in the chest and irritableness”
1 sometimes associated with stagnation of liver
qi. I have in some contexts used the term “irritability” to translate “
xinfan”.
Chapter 5 deals with five major categories of cancer to illustrate the principles and methods employed and the results achieved. These cases are drawn from Professor Yu’s medical files from the 1970s to 2006. These cases are but a few of a more comprehensive list cited in an earlier publication in Chinese.2
The final chapter deals with the prevention of cancer and the management of diets and daily living habits for cancer patients. This is a useful chapter for the general reader who wishes to understand Chinese medicine for health cultivation and disease prevention. Chapters 2, 3 and 6 in combination can therefore be read in isolation from the rest of the book as a general introduction to TCM, health cultivation and the prevention of cancer.
The TCM Approach to Cancer Management
The TCM management of cancer described in this book is holistic in the sense that, unlike Western medicine, it does not focus on the destruction or containment of cancer cells. It looks at the presence of a malignant tumour as the result of imbalances in the body’s internal host environment that leads to abnormal cell growth. Its approach to management of the disease is therefore one of creating and regulating this internal environment to give the patient’s own body the best chance of defending itself and/or co-existing with the cancer cells.
TCM oncologists like Professor Yu recognize and understand the power of Western drugs, radiotherapy and surgery in removing, destroying and containing tumours and cancer cells. They also believe in the judicious integration of Western and Chinese healing methods to give the patient the best of both worlds: one treats the disease; the other strengthens the host body to do battle with the disease by resolving internal imbalances known as TCM syndromes. If one may be allowed to use a somewhat invidious analogy, Western methods can be compared to the use of overwhelming force to attack the military bases of an occupying enemy, with accompanying collateral damage, destroying the homes and lives of innocent civilians. Chinese medical therapy, on the other hand, would be the equivalent of soft power used to build up the resistance of local people to repel and contain foreign enemy forces. Working together, they can achieve a much better result than would be possible with each acting alone. The selected cases presented here from Professor Yu’s medical files will help illustrate this principle.
Hong Hai
December 2011
1 Chinese-English Dictionary of Traditional Chinese Medicine. (1996) Renmin Weisheng Publishing House, Beijing, p. 229.
2 Yu Rencun
et al. (ed.) (2007)
Yu Rencun , China Press of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Beijing.
![]()
CHAPTER 2
PRINCIPLES OF DIAGNOSIS AND THERAPY IN TRADITIONAL CHINESE MEDICINE
Chinese medicine as practised today in China, some East Asian countries and the West is both an art and a science. To the extent that it has a scientific aspect to it, we can regard it as an empirically based form of healing that has progressed over the centuries by drawing on the accumulated clinical experience of successful physicians as well as — albeit to a lesser extent — modern scientific knowledge of anatomy and physiology.
Ancient Chinese medicine was formalized as a system of thought and practice after the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949. “Traditional Chinese medicine” (TCM) is the common term for the modernized form of Chinese medicine.
TCM is described as “traditional” to indicate that it is derived from ancient medicine. It retains many of the core concepts and theories of ancient medicine and is based on a body of theory distinct from that of Western medicine practised in Chinese hospitals and clinics today. TCM is taught through medical degree courses in Chinese universities as well as tertiary institutions in East Asia, Australia, Europe and North America. In most of these countries, these courses are prerequisites for registration as licensed TCM practitioners by health authorities. Although Western medicine is dominant and is the mainstream form of medicine practised in these countries, TCM plays a significant and recognized role in national healthcare in China (including Hong Kong and Taiwan), Japan, Korea, Malaysia and Singapore, and has a sizeable and growing following in many Western countries.1
TCM should also be distinguished from Chinese folk medicine handed down largely by word of mouth and practised unregulated (strictly speaking, illegitimately) in China and some other Asian countries. Such folk medicine may have arcane practices like blood-letting, divination and the use of unusual drugs and animal parts not listed in the Chinese pharmacopoeia. The concepts and principles discussed in this book are not concerned with Chinese folk medicine.
It should be noted that the selective use of materia medica (herbs) and herbal formulations by Western doctors as complementary treatments for disease is not part of TCM. By way of analogy, when Western doctors use quinine for the treatment of malaria they are not practising Indian medicine, even though the drug was originally extracted from a South American tree used by native Indians to treat fever. Likewise, extracts of the ginkgo leaf used by German scientists to manufacture ginkgo biloba, which is claimed to promote blood circulation, is not Chinese medicine, even t...
