Am J Chin Med. 1981 Autumn; 9(3): 197-204.

Oriental medicine: a computerized study of complex recipes and their components: analysis of prescriptions used in the traditional medicine of Japan and Korea.

Brekhman II, Grinevitch MA.

The materials presented here were obtained through a computerized study of 158 Chinese, 204 Korean and 196 Japanese traditional prescriptions with complex and multicomponent characteristics. Oriental medicine strives to complicate sets of prescriptions by using complex recipes and duplicating agents possessing identical effects. The absence of intolerability and side effects of these prescriptions may be given to account for their complexity far closer to the information contents of living bodies than modern scientific medicines which frequently apply substances synthesized or extracted from plants in pure form. Oriental remedial therapy is founded on the use of natural medicines of plant-, animal-, and mineral origin in the form of relatively large amounts of non-treated multi-component mixtures with a preferentially general effect on the organism. It involves the use of the underground parts of plants, aqueous extracts or ground medicinal raw materials. The absence of intensely active and poisonous plants and the scarcity of alkaloid-bearing plants explain the use of remedial mixtures in relatively large doses. Agents possessing antitoxic, anti-inflammatory and especially toning effects are most frequently used. Toning herbs should be given increased attention. A synthesis of traditional medicine and contemporary science on chemical composition and action of remedial plants and animals, and also on the effects that arise with applying complex prescriptions is essentially needed.