Materia Medica

[Guest guest]

All:

Take a look at John Chen's new book " Chinese Medical Herbology and

Pharmacology' at

http://www.aompress.com/Product.htm

This looks like an excellent book. Great info on combinations and

represenative formulas containing the combinations. The text also

gives more pharmacology information than other similar books and has

chemical structure diagrams and color photos.

Warren Sheir

[Guest guest]

>>In one of your posts you alluded to a materia medica you were working

>on. I would love to know more about it, for instance: how many herbs,

>what type of information, when it will be available, how it compares to

>the Chen & Chen and Bensky, et al. Materia Medicas.

 

The Chen & Chen materia medica is a comprehensive text that contains a

great deal of useful information on pharmacology, potential herb-drug

interactions, and other miscellaneous scientific material. I really

like the book and think that they did a good job on it. The Chen &

Chen MM is a typical representation of the ¡§cutting edge,¡¨ integrative

style that is increasingly common in Asia. In other words, it

contains the basic essentials of TCM, but the expression style is

geared slightly towards Western medicine.

 

In Asia, many practitioners are trained in WM and many of the foreign

students are MDs. A great deal of effort is put into research, and

some practitioners are interested in modernizing Chinese medicine,

demonstrating its utility through clinical trials and drug

development, and bringing what Chinese medicine has to offer into the

world of integrative care. In my opinion, Chen & Chen¡¦s book is a

model text for integrative medicine- for people who want to study

Chinese medicine and communicate about it and use it within a Western

paradigm, it is ideal. The Chinese medicine aspect of the book is

solid, but I think its greatest strength lies in the modern elements-

pharmacology, herb-drug interactions, etc. I think that all

practitioners should be aware of the basic pharmacology and potential

interactions of herbs, and I think Chen & Chen¡¦s book is among the

best single sources of this info.

 

By contrast, Bensky et al.¡¦s materia medica is targeted towards

¡§clean, straight¡¨ Chinese medicine. It has largely ceded the

territory of pharmacology and interactions in light of the

accomplishments of Chen & Chen¡¦s text, and has directed its focus on

other aspects of Chinese herbal medicine. The two texts aren¡¦t

directly comparable because each offers something unique, and each

does a good job within its special focus. Bensky¡¦s cannot compete

with Chen¡¦s in terms of pharmacology, yet Chen¡¦s cannot compete with

Bensky¡¦s in terms of historical background. Bensky¡¦s text has a lot

of very useful information on identifying substitute herbs and

selecting the correct species, which is highly useful since most

practitioners are minimally trained in pharmacy. In my mind, the most

interesting and valuable component is the background information on

the drugs. There is a lot of historical information there and a lot

of classical quotes are brought into the text.

 

Chinese materia medicas, especially the really large ones, typically

feature pharmacology as well as classical material. A direct

translation of a large Chinese MM, such as the yellow hardcover text

by the People¡¦s Medical Publishing House (ren min wei sheng), would

easily fill 1600-2000 pages in English. At this point, the text

becomes an unwieldy double-volume hardback that may cost over $200.

So essentially Chen & Chen and Bensky, Clavey, & Stoger have split

this material into two separate books. One book features the basic

TCM info and the modern research, and the other book features the

basic TCM info and the historical research. I think the quality of

the ¡§core¡¨ information between these two texts is about the same.

 

So where does our book fit in?

 

The ¡§Concise Chinese Materia Medica¡¨ was initially designed as a basic

text for students, though it has expanded slightly in its scope since

its inception. The text is a concise guide to medicinal therapy that

contains all the information that students need for their examinations

and clinical application, without a great deal of extraneous

information that makes the book heavy, inconvenient, and a stretch to

the student budget. Our book is not trying to mimic Chen & Chen¡¦s

book in terms of pharmacology, nor is it trying to displace Bensky¡¦s

book in terms of historical information. However, it aims to

complement and surpass both of these texts in certain other aspects.

 

Basically, what the Concise Chinese Materia Medica offers is the

following:

 

1) Greatly expanded chapter introductions. Most chapter introductions

in Bensky and Chen¡¦s texts are rather brief because these texts

emphasize voluminous monographs. However, many students lack a strong

understanding of how medicinals in each category are used. They do

not know how to select specific medicinals that appear to have similar

actions, and are unclear about many clinically essential concepts. We

have worked hard to have chapter introductions that provide students

with a more complete understanding of the medicinals in each category,

and we have tried to create chapter introductions that are more

comprehensive and educational than the ones provided in the other

materia medicas. These chapter introductions emphasize the unique

aspects of the medicinals, as well as important clinical concepts to

clarify the actions of the medicinals and the conditions that they treat.

 

2) Because the text is designed for student use, we have incorporated

a number of useful features to assist with studying. There is a

CD-ROM included in the text that contains self-test software for

students to use. It features a very large question bank that reviews

virtually all the information of the text, and also contains

challenging questions taken from Chinese exam preparation books. The

CD-ROM also contains a digitally searchable version of the core data

found in the text; this can be used both on PDAs and computers, making

the data even more accessible for reference in the clinic or for

portable study. Since many students type this material up by hand for

use on their PDAs, this feature is a big time-saver.

 

We are also hoping to include a digital version of virtual flashcards

that can be printed from home to automatically make flashcards. This

should hopefully minimize manual typing or handwritten flashcards,

saving students¡¦ valuable time. Currently, many students buy Zoo

cards, which cost more than our entire book and E-package, and

generally fill students¡¦ heads so full with silly images of colorful

bears that they cannot remember the actual data at test time. Whoever

is making these cards is pulling a lucrative profit off of stolen

copyright-bound material, yet these cards actually do little to

improve student performance on exams because the only really memorable

thing they offer is some silly image of red whale with a fire

underneath. But that is another story.

 

3) Our text offers a traceable, direct translation of the basic

student texts used in Chinese universities. Chinese medical board

exams are based upon the 5th edition of their standard curriculum

texts, although 6th and 7th editions have now been produced. The 7th

edition is spread among multiple publishers, while the 5th and 6th

edition were put out by a single publisher. Essentially, all these

books contain the same information. We made our text by compiling and

translating the same core information that Chinese students are

required to know. Thus, the level of detail that is expressed in our

text gives the Western reader essentially the exact same level of

basic information that Chinese students are responsible for.

 

When I was a student, most of our advanced courses utilized books that

were based on the terminology used in the Practical Dictionary of

. Indeed, over 2/3 of all the professional-level

books sold at present use PD terminology. Using PD terminology helps

students develop a solid conceptual framework of CM and also allows

students to rapidly bridge the language barrier if they elect to

pursue post-grad studies in Chinese. However, despite having many

valuable advanced works written in PD terminology, there are no basic

foundational texts for medicinal therapy that introduce the properties

of all the agents within the same seamless system. Our book rectifies

this issue because it expresses all the core information about each

medicinal with terms that are consistent with those used in more

advanced texts by Blue Poppy and Paradigm, which are likely to be

consistent with the WHO standards in the future.

 

Basically, we advocate a no-middleman approach. If you want to know

exactly what the Chinese materia medica says, you can find it

expressed in our text. There will be no simplification of concepts,

no excision of metaphors, and no CM integrity hidden behind imprecise

biomedical language. Anytime a student has a question about what an

action word or a disease name means, they will have publicly-available

resources to research the issue.

 

4) Finally, our text is lightweight and affordable. Chen & Chen¡¦s

text, while very well-priced for its size, is nonetheless heavy and

somewhat expensive at $90. Bensky¡¦s text is even heavier, and costs

$125. By comparison, our text costs $50, doesn¡¦t make your backpack a

daunting burden, and comes with a variety of bonus digital features.

 

Since our text is designed to be concise and targeted towards the core

information that students need for their exams and the clinic, it

covers only the most commonly used 400+ medicinals. While the text is

currently at the final stages of production, it will nonetheless take

several more months to reach the shelves, largely because of the

challenge of producing all the digital materials.

 

The body of the text was translated by Nigel Wiseman and yours truly.

Bob Damone is one of our senior editors, and additionally contributed

a variety of useful information derived from his years of experience

in teaching this material. Feng Ye served as our other senior editor,

and helped considerably by clarifying ambiguities in source texts and

directing us towards excellent additional resources. Sabine Wilms

wrote much of the historical introduction (Sabine did her PhD work

with Don Harper, and is a very accomplished Chinese medical

historian). Z¡¦ev Rosenberg wrote the forward, and multiple members of

the PCOM faculty have provided us with invaluable input, including

CHA¡¦s founder, . The book is published by Paradigm

Publications.

 

Our text evolved with the input of clinicians, scholars, students, and

educators, and was conscientiously crafted in hopes that it will find

a niche alongside the other prominent materia medicas. We are not

aiming to replace the other materia medicas, but we hope to complement

them by providing certain features that they have not developed.

Hopefully clear terminology, affordability, and useful digital aids

will allow our text to work its way into the libraries of interested

students and practitioners.

 

If anyone would like to see a sample chapter, you may write to me at

ericbrand, and I will be happy to email you a sample.

(sometimes cuts off the email address, it should be ericbrand@

gmail .com - no spaces).

 

Eric Brand