G.M, C.M. & Grey Teeth

[Guest guest]

Bob

I have a generalized question about physical signs and their interpretations in

modern TCM. Dr Lai in our Dx classes gave us many of such correlations between

signs such as gray teeth, dry teeth etc and their diagnostic interpretation. For

years I tried to do what you just did, i.e. try to correlate such signs with

other s/s to corroborate such conclusions and i have to say that in more cases

than not i could not. ie for example a patient with red cheeks is just as likely

to have a predominant cold s/s complex as he she to have heat or empty heat

related s/s complexes (unless acute). For years i have struggled with this. At

this point I do not think you can take ANY sign and make any conclusion from it.

Flexibility is always necessary and many times one needs to know what to ignore

and what not too. While more information (ie CM literature) my give you more

clues, i real life it does nothing for an individual case.

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

Yesterday I did an intake on a new patient with grey teeth. I aksed

her if she had ever taken tetracycline. She said no. As part of this

dialogue, she asked what grey teeth meant in C.M. and I had to say I

had no idea. Later on, after I had completed her pattern

discrimination, I went to Giovanni's new book on diagnosis and looked

up grey teeth. In it, he says they indicate yin vacuity with vacuity

heat or stomach heat & kidney yin vacuity complicated by dampness and

turbidity. Because the patient was 49, I had asked her quite

thoroughly about any kidney yin or kidney yang vacuity symptoms and

had gotten zero positives for any type of kidney vacuity. The only

patterns I could definitely make a case for were a liver-spleen

disharmony with blood vacuity and dampness.

 

Alon has complained repeatedly on this list that, due to a small

patient sample, some of us jump to clinical conclusions without

adequate evidence. So my question is, have others on this list found

any of Giovanni's diagnostic indications in his latest tome to be

incomplete and/or erroneous? As has been recently pointed out on this

list, it appears that Giovanni pays translators to provide him with

Chinese source materials, and it is my observation that even Chinese

sources sometimes present generalizations which are backed up by

limited, incomplete clinical evidence. (A reason why it is necessary

to read widely in the C.M. literature.)

 

Bob

[Guest guest]

On Feb 23, 2005, at 7:57 AM, wrote:

 

> for example a patient with red cheeks is just as likely to have a

> predominant cold s/s complex as he she to have heat or empty heat

> related s/s complexes (unless acute). For years i have struggled with

> this.

 

One thing our Chinese literature does not include are European

genetics. In particular when I get someone from European ancestry with

a significant amount of red in their face, I ask if their from Ireland

or the Nordic countries. In these cases, they just happen to look red,

but there is no particular heat taking place.

 

> At this point I do not think you can take ANY sign and make any

> conclusion from it. Flexibility is always necessary and many times one

> needs to know what to ignore and what not too.

 

I agree. Diagnosis isn't just what information you include, but which

signs and symptoms to ignore.

 

--

 

Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional.

-Adlai Stevenson

[Guest guest]

Alon,

 

In general, I agree -- no one sign or symptoms indicates any one

pattern all the time. That being said, there are always exceptions to

the rule. Over the past two years, I have identified about 10 signs or

symptoms that do always and reliably indicate a single pattern/disease

mechanism. I refer to these as " hallaluelia symptoms. " However, grey

teeth do not seem to be one of these based on my limited experience.

 

Bob

 

, " "

<alonmarcus@w...> wrote:

> Bob

> I have a generalized question about physical signs and their

interpretations in modern TCM. Dr Lai in our Dx classes gave us many

of such correlations between signs such as gray teeth, dry teeth etc

and their diagnostic interpretation. For years I tried to do what you

just did, i.e. try to correlate such signs with other s/s to

corroborate such conclusions and i have to say that in more cases than

not i could not. ie for example a patient with red cheeks is just as

likely to have a predominant cold s/s complex as he she to have heat

or empty heat related s/s complexes (unless acute). For years i have

struggled with this. At this point I do not think you can take ANY

sign and make any conclusion from it. Flexibility is always necessary

and many times one needs to know what to ignore and what not too.

While more information (ie CM literature) my give you more clues, i

real life it does nothing for an individual case.

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

Alon,

 

I absolutely knew you'd ask this. Sorry, this is part of what I teach

for a living. However, most of the list will be appearing in my and

Honora's new book, The Successful Chinese Herbalist, due out in a

couple of months.

 

Bob

 

, " "

<alonmarcus@w...> wrote:

> Bob

> Can you share these i am very curious, for example i have heard some

people say that cold feet always mean k def which i just cant agree with.

>

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

, " Bob Flaws " <pemachophel2001>

wrote:

 

> While more information (ie CM literature) my give you more clues, i

> real life it does nothing for an individual case.

 

Actually, Alon, I think you may have ironically provided us with the best reason

ever

presented here for reading chinese and reading widely in the CM lit. If one

could and did

read wide widely in this literature, it would have been a simple matter to

identify

consensus or the lack thereof on many points early in one's training and

therefore not

have to wait for 20 years of your own experience. You have determined the truth

of this

matter from your observation over time, but a native chinese reader could have

determined the same thing in a few hours of literature review. He would easily

determine

that despite certain idiosyncratic references to thing like grey teeth, there is

no evidence

of any consensus on this matter. Now, if over a lifetime, you discover this

idiosyncrasy to

actually be true, wonderful. But we certainly don't need to spend decades

assuming it is

true in advance of any evidence (or conversely dismissing anything we have not

seen with

our own eyes despite widespread consensus in the literature). We should instead

stand on

the shoulders of those who came before us and move on. If one has never stood

on these

shoulders, how can one say how far one might see? The alternative is to crawl

with our

faces in the mud and hope we stumble across something along this plodding way.

That is

not very scientific at all.

 

[Guest guest]

You have determined the truth of this

matter from your observation over time, but a native chinese reader could have

determined the same thing in a few hours of literature review.

>>>>Not true bob. Dr lai gave us the consensus and what i am saying after 20

years i do not believe it is clinically accurate.The diagnosis class was based

on standard texts with signs such as teeth conditions related to diagnosis were

standard consensus. It goes to the bottom of where I at this point with much of

TCM and that is i have to question the concensus.

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

I might have missed part of this topic after a long hiatus, but the

simple thing to check for - Is she bulemic?

 

Geoff

 

, " Bob Flaws "

<pemachophel2001> wrote:

>

> Yesterday I did an intake on a new patient with grey teeth. I aksed

> her if she had ever taken tetracycline. She said no. As part of

this

> dialogue, she asked what grey teeth meant