Traditional Vietnamese medicine (Y học Cổ truyền Việt Nam), also known as Southern Herbology (Thuốc Nam) is a traditional medicine practiced by Vietnamese people. It is influenced by traditional Chinese medicine. The other traditional medicine that is also practiced in Vietnam is

traditional Chinese medicine Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an alternative medical practice drawn from traditional medicine in China. It has been described as "fraught with pseudoscience", with the majority of its treatments having no logical mechanism of acti ...

(Trung Y), also known as Northern Herbology (Thuốc Bắc). Thuốc Nam is one of two kinds of folk remedies known to villagers, the other being the traditional exercise

dưỡng sinh The exercise dưỡng sinh or Dưỡng Sinh (compare Chinese ''Yangsheng'' 養生) is a form of partly indigenous breathing and yoga exercise similar to Tai Chi popularized in Vietnam by the historian and political activist Nguyễn Khắc Viện ...

Defining principles

Traditional Vietnamese medicine differs from traditional Chinese medicine in which it relies wholly on native ingredients which are then used in their fresh state or simply dried. Vietnamese medicine typically does not require complicated

decoction Decoction is a method of extraction by boiling herbal or plant material (which may include stems, roots, bark and rhizomes) to dissolve the chemicals of the material. It is the most common preparation method in various herbal-medicine systems. Dec ...

seen in Chinese medicine. Even common herbs and vegetables like rau răm, kinh giới, cải cúc, rau muốngRau muống: một vị thuốc Nam thuần túy
are used. The flowers of '' Magnolia champaca'', ''

Jasminum sambac ''Jasminum sambac'' (Arabian jasmine or Sambac jasmine) is a species of jasmine native to tropical Asia, from the Indian subcontinent to Southeast Asia. It is cultivated in many places, especially West Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia. It is ...

'' are also employed for their pharmacologic properties. Animal products like

silkworms The domestic silk moth (''Bombyx mori''), is an insect from the moth family Bombycidae. It is the closest relative of ''Bombyx mandarina'', the wild silk moth. The silkworm is the larva or caterpillar of a silk moth. It is an economically im ...

are infrequently used. In addition to ingested preparations, ointments and

poultice A poultice, also called a cataplasm, is a soft moist mass, often heated and medicated, that is spread on cloth and placed over the skin to treat an aching, inflamed, or painful part of the body. It can be used on wounds, such as cuts. 'Poultice ...

are also part of the repertoire, along with steaming therapy (xông hơi).

Textual records

Various

compendium A compendium (plural: compendia or compendiums) is a comprehensive collection of information and analysis pertaining to a body of knowledge. A compendium may concisely summarize a larger work. In most cases, the body of knowledge will concern a sp ...

s and

treatise A treatise is a formal and systematic written discourse on some subject, generally longer and treating it in greater depth than an essay, and more concerned with investigating or exposing the principles of the subject and its conclusions." Tre ...

s on traditional Vietnamese medicine include the 11-volume ''Nam dược thần hiệu'' by the 14th century

physician A physician (American English), medical practitioner (Commonwealth English), medical doctor, or simply doctor, is a health professional who practices medicine, which is concerned with promoting, maintaining or restoring health through th ...

Tuệ Tĩnh and ''Hải Thượng y tông tâm lĩnh'' by the 18th century physician Hải Thượng Lãn Ông. Other pre-20th century texts include ''Nam dược chỉ danh truyền'', ''Tiểu nhi khoa diễn Quốc âm''.

Application

Thuốc Nam is usually sought for more common ailments like

cough A cough is a sudden expulsion of air through the large breathing passages that can help clear them of fluids, irritants, foreign particles and microbes. As a protective reflex, coughing can be repetitive with the cough reflex following three ph ...

s and

fever Fever, also referred to as pyrexia, is defined as having a temperature above the normal range due to an increase in the body's temperature set point. There is not a single agreed-upon upper limit for normal temperature with sources using val ...

Smallpox Smallpox was an infectious disease caused by variola virus (often called smallpox virus) which belongs to the genus Orthopoxvirus. The last naturally occurring case was diagnosed in October 1977, and the World Health Organization (WHO) c ...

, a common occurrence in traditional Vietnam, also has a number of prescriptions in historic texts.Chữ Nôm trong kho thư tịch y dược
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Usage in immigrant Vietnamese populations

According to one study published in 2016, among the urban Vietnamese community near

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

, around 68% of 200 respondents reported using Traditional Vietnamese medicine in addition to Western medical practices.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Thuoc Nam Vietnamese culture Southeast Asian traditional medicine Science and technology in Vietnam

Defining principles

Textual records

Application

Usage in immigrant Vietnamese populations

See also

References