The diet therapy of TCM
Chinese Medicine
• Diet• Exercise( breathing
exercise—qi gong)• Rest• Acupuncture and
moxibustion• Chinese herbal formulas
TCM Food Therapy
• The Art of Cooking and Preparing Food to help maintain optimal health
• Let Food be your Medicine -- Hippocrates
Diet therapy in 5-element
• Fire -- Bitter• Earth -- Sweet• Metal -- Pungent• Water -- Salty• Wood -- Sour
Bitter
Sweet
PungentSalty
Sour
5 Element Meat Sources
Element Flavor Meat Grain
Fire Bitter Lamb Corn
Earth Sweet Cow Grain
Metal Pungent Horse Rice
Water Salty Pig Bean
Wood Sour Chicken Wheat
Diet therapy in 4 seasons
• The pulse tends to be taut in spring, full in summer, floating in autumn, and sunken in winter
Features of four season
• 四季氣候的特點春溫 Spring: Warm
夏熱 Summer: Hot
秋燥 Fall: Dry
冬寒 Winter: Cold
How to diet therapy in four seasons?
nourishing yang in spring and summer time,
nourishing yin in autumn and winter time.
Spring
• Spring is the season of new birth and new growth. According to TCM, spring belongs to the wood element and dominates liver functioning.
• The principle of diet therapy in spring: – to protect and nourish liver.
Diet selection
Good: Hot and sweet food
Avoid: Sour and astringent food
• Spring foods: Chinese yam, bamboo shoot and mushrooms.
summer
• heart over-function, and there is too much yang qi flows outward to the exterior part of the body.
• There are two principles of diet therapy in summer:– First: Focus on protecting heartheart– Second: The weather of long summer is usually wet.
And the wetness hurts stomach and spleen. So we need to pay attention on protecting spleenprotecting spleen.
Diet selection
• Good: Bitter food, sour and salty flavors
• Avoid: Hot and ice-cold food• Summer foods:
– bitter gourd, watermelon, strawberries, tomatoes, cucumber, wax gourd, lotus root, lotus seed, bean sprouts, duck and fish.
•
It is a Chinese tradition in summer to make soups for clearing summer heat, eliminating dampness and promoting digestion.
Fall
• lung system, dominates the skin, respiration, body fluids metabolism
• The dry weather usually causes an itchy throat, a dry nose, chapped lips, rough skin, hair loss and dry stools.
• Principle of diet therapy in fall:– Focus on protecting Lung and ying
energy
Diet selection
• Good: sour and moisture food
• Avoid: Hot and spicy food– Fall foods : lily bulb, white fungus, nuts or
seeds, pear, lotus root, pumpkin, honey, soy milk
Winter• Winter is also a good time to boost
the natural constitution of the body and improve symptoms associated with chronic conditions.
• Energizing herbs such as ginseng, wolfberry, angelica, rhemannia root, can be used for this purpose.
• Principle of diet therapy in winter: – Focus on protecting kidney
Diet selection
• Good: Hot and spicy food
• Avoid: salty and hot food– Winter foods:Mutton, beef, goose, duck, eggs,
rabbit meat, Chinese yam, sesame, glutinous rice, dates, longan, black fungus,
Suggests
• Eating native foods • eating locally-grown foods and those in
season. • Natural, home-grown and chemical-free
products are the most nutritious foods.
5 、 external application about the women’s diseases
• The head is regarded as "the house of essential substance" in TCM, essence from the organs are gathered there, and blood and qi always flow through it.
• Medicinal pillows can make the properties of herbs enter through the head.
• Treat:dizziness, poor memory, ear ringing, blurred version, anxiety, facial paralysis due to strokes, shoulder pain and jaw pain.
• It also has been reported that these pillows are also effective for headache, insomnia, hypertension and neck problems.
• In TCM, the feet are the start of the three yin meridians and the end of the three yang meridians with more than sixty acupoints below the ankles.
• Bathing the feet regularly can stimulate the acupoints, activate the flows in the meridians, and thus enhance body functioning.
Tuina--massage
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