Study on the history of Traditional Chinese Medicine to treat diabetes

IntroductionIn order to introduce the diabetology history in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), including nomenclature, understanding, treatment, prevention, etc., our research specifically focused on ancient medical literature used in the evaluation of diabetes in TCM or wasting-thirst (xiao-ke).MethodologyThe history of wasting-thirst was classified into four periods: (1) the nomenclature of wasting-thirst; (2) the monograph of wasting-thirst; (3) the understandings of sweet urine and its extensive development; and (4) the integration of wasting-thirst and diabetes.ResultsBy mining and reviewing the literature in the 2000-year history of wasting-thirst, it is believed that TCM has a profound understanding of, and effective management on, diabetes and its complications. For period one, wasting-thirst was first recorded in The Yellow Emperor's Classic of Internal Medicine. For period two, it was elaborated in Treatise on Febrile and Miscellenous Disease, and its “pathology” was summarized as “three wasting-thirsts (upper, middle, lower)” from the perspectives of spatial locations of organs, which serves as a guide in clinical practice. For period three, a self-contained system, including diagnosis, treatment, prevention, nursing, and education, had been established. For period four, wasting-thirst was intimately integrated into diabetes in The Integration of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine.DiscussionTraditional Chinese Medicine harbors a long history of treating wasting-thirst/diabetes. With its unique therapeutic approaches, TCM is an effective system of understanding and managing diabetes as proven by medical literatures, clinical benefits and basic research studies.