Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is a complete medical system that has been used to prevent, diagnose, and treat illnesses for more than three thousand years. It is developed as a form of noninvasive therapeutic intervention, relying mainly on observation and description of the nature of infections to create remedies. Earliest literature can be traced back to HuangDi NeiJing, originated as early as 1000 B.C. From then, TCM is formulated through almost three thousand years of observation and practical experience. TCM treatments include herbal treatments, acupuncture, massage therapy, food therapy, Qi Gong and Chinese martial arts, and so on. Among them, herbal treatments, which have been practically testified and improved over thousands years, are most important. Each herbal treatment is a combination of various herbs, tailored to enhance and balance their properties and functions. These treatments used to be available in limited forms: raw herbs to be boiled in water, ground herbs packed in pills, powders for external use, and etc.. With speeding up of daily life and progressing on science and technology, nowadays TCM based formula herbal extracts have been made to all kinds of forms, from tablet to spray, from ointment to paste, and from herbal pillow to spa salts. |