Guest guest Posted October 2, 2004 Report Share Posted October 2, 2004 Roger - This issue of the choppy pulse has come up many times over the years. I performed a brief experiment about two years ago on this list. I asked listers to describe the image of a choppy pulse. No one gave the same description. This confusion around this issue is not just a contemporary one as you will see from the list below. The choppy pulse is a complex image. However, there are modern practitioners such as Dr. John Shen who have suggested that the choppy pulse be considered as a simple image. LuYubin also describes choppy as a simple image [1] paraphrased: ‘the rough nature is juxtaposed to the smoothness of the slippery quality.’ However, Lu does not specify what aspect is rough. The choppy quality described throughout the literature may include features such as changing rate at rest, changing amplitude/intensity, slow, fine, and changing qualities. Wang Shu-he describes the choppy pulse as [2] fine and slow, coming and going with difficulty and scattered or with an interruption, but has the ability to recover. Other versions of the Mai Jing describe it as short and floating or another version describes it as short with interruption or scattered. Jin Wei: " this is a pulse that is felt fine, slow, short, scattered, hesitant, and unsmooth, like scraping bamboo with a knife. " Maccioccia: " This pulse feels rough under the finger: instead of a smooth pulse wave, it feels as though it had a jagged edge to it. Choppy also indicates a pulse that changes rapidly both in rate and quality " Li Shizhen: “A pulse which feels thin, minute and short and has an uneven flow, beating three and five times with irregular rhythm, is called choppy.....It feels like a knife scraping bamboo, rough and jagged. It is easily scattered like rain falling onto the sand. It also moves very slowly and at irregular depths, like an ill silkworm eating a leaf.†Wang Shuhe: “a fine and slow pulse, coming and going with difficulty and scattered or with an interruption†Kaptchuk: irregular in rhythm. In this case it iscalled the three and five not adjusted sometimes three beats per breath and sometimes five beats per breath. Wu Shuiwan: " The movement of this pulse is feltas rough and choppy. It is not fluent. It is slow and thin. The wave of thispulse is short. " Deng Tietao: it should feel slow and uneven, fine, small, short. CAM: " A hesitant pulse feels rough and uneven......stagnations, produce a hesitant and forceful pulse ........insufficiency creates a hesitant and weak pulse " Wu Shuiwan and Jin Wei both describe the pulse as short, also, Yi Tian Ni used this description; it is a wave that halts abruptly as if it has hit a mass. This is very different from a wave that gives way suddenly due to a deficiency of Qi. Macicocia who studied with Dr. Shen describes a jagged edge, however, then he retreats into the notion of rate as a defining feature of the choppy pulse. [1] Lu Yubin. Pulse Diagnosis. Shandong Science and Technology Press. [2] Wang Shu-he. Translated by Yang Shou-zhang. The Pulse Classic. Pp. 4. Blue Poppy Press 1997. Best - Will > To detect a choppy pulse, one must essentially store an image of the way > each pulse beat feels and then compare it with the next pulse beat. > (Mathematically this is called auto-correlation.) It means that each pulse beat will > have a slightly different pulse pressure profile in time. The trickiest aspect > of this is to detect choppiness in a pulse that is otherwise smooth in profile > - a slippery-choppy pulse is one example. > > We use video simulation software to demonstrate this to our students, and it > helps greatly. A picture is worth a thousand words. See the sequence of 5 > slides starting at: > > http://www.rmhiherbal.org/tchs-cd/pu-01.html > > The sequence of slides shown above illustrates several different complex > pulse types. > (Keep in mind that these are snapshots of moving images.) > > In a slippery-choppy pulse, the pulse pressure profile will not have the > classical quality of " knife scraping bamboo " , but the shape does change, and > this can include variations in strength, which is one manifestation of > choppiness. William R. Morris, LAc, OMD, MSEd Dean of Educational Advancement Emperor's College of Oriental Medicine 310-453-8300 phone 310-829-3838 fax will http://emperors.edu/doctoral/doc_mission.html This message is a PRIVATE communication. This e-mail and any attachments may be confidential and/or legally privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, please do not read, copy, or use it, and do not disclose it to others. Please notify the sender of the delivery error by replying to this message with the word delete in the subject column, and then delete it and any attachments from your system. Thank you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted October 2, 2004 Report Share Posted October 2, 2004 Clearly we're going to have to make our own English standards. Until then in my own charts I write Rough, Arhythmic and Inconsistent. doug , WMorris116@A... wrote: > Roger - > > > > This issue of the choppy pulse has come up many times over the years. I > performed a brief experiment about two years ago on this list. I asked listers to > describe the image of a choppy pulse. No one gave the same description. This > confusion around this issue is not just a contemporary one as you will see from > the list below. > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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