Asthma Sufferers Breathe Easier: A Different Perspective

A few years ago I was interviewed along with Warren Levin and Leo Galland for a book on Asthma, titled, Breathe Again Naturally and Reclaim Your Life.  The author, Mimi Weisberg, presents many different points of view on the causes and treatment of Asthma according to Oriental Medicine and Nutritional Biochemistry.

My interview for the book focused on the theories and treatment of Asthma according to Oriental Medicine. The theory I discuss in the book dates back to the Hun dynasty (220AD).  It is a classical text, the Shang Hun Lun (Treatise on Cold Induced Disorders), written by one the Great Masters and Physicians of Oriental Medicine, Chang Chong Ching. 

This classical text brilliantly explains specific symptoms and guidelines for treatment strategies related to colds and flu that can be acute or chronic.  The treatment protocols are still being used successfully today. 

The way we work with Asthma or any western pathology according to Oriental Medical Theory, is to translate the condition into the diagnostic categories according to Oriental Medicine.  For example we can divide the causes of Asthma into many different categories.  For this discussion, however,  I will present two of them.

Causes of Asthma According to Oriental Medicine:

Cold Phlegm; a patient with cold phlegm will present with copious amounts of sputum, a productive cough, a thick white coating on the tongue and a slippery pulse.

Kidney Qi and Yang Deficiency a patient will present with fatigue, cold limbs, low back pain, poor concentration, exercised induced asthma or difficulty breathing on, a pale swollen tongue with a deep or submerged pulse.

Treatment Strategies According To Oriental Medicine:

With Cold Phlegm Asthma, we remove sweet sticky foods from the diet (see my shopping list) which will reduce dampness and phlegm.  Conversely, one should begin to increase warming spices to help induce sweating and clear phlegm.  A traditional herbal formula that may be used for this condition would be a combination called Minor Blue Green Dragon (xiao qing long tang), which clears cold phlegm from the lungs and stops wheezing.

With Kidney Qi & Yang Deficient Asthma, we increase warming foods and spices and reduce cold food from the diet like green leafy vegetables and tropical fruits.  A traditional herbal formula used for this condition is Rehmannia 8 (jin gui shen qi wan).  Tshis formula strengthens the Kidney Qi and Yang and allows the free flow of Qi from the lung thus reducing wheezing.

 Drew DiVittorio, Dipl,.(NCCAOM), Oriental Medicine & Nutrition

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