TCM Diagnostic and Therapeutic Methods

Ⅸ-2Traditional MedicineZhaoyang, BeijingBatch 5 (2021)Extension Item

01 · Historical Records

Kong Bohua was born in Jinan, Shandong, in 1884, a seventy-fourth-generation descendant of Confucius. He began practicing medicine at the age of 20. In 1910 he was invited to serve as a medical officer at the Beijing Outer City Government Hospital, where he formed his distinctive academic characteristic of “integrating the cold-damage and warm-disease approaches.” In 1929, he united with eminent figures of the traditional Chinese medicine field to jointly advocate the establishment of Beiping's first institution of higher learning in traditional Chinese medicine — the Beiping Institute of National Medicine — which lasted 15 years and trained more than 700 traditional Chinese medicine personnel, many of whom became backbone figures in the cause of Chinese medicine.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

The academic system of the Kong Bohua family medical lineage takes “first differentiating the two guiding principles, then dividing into the six essentials” and “damp-heat and hidden qi smoldering within the body, then stirred into disease by added pathogenic qi” as its core elements. Its main feature is the emphasis on yin and yang as the “two guiding principles” that command the analysis and treatment of disease, with exterior-interior, cold-heat and deficiency-excess as the “six essentials,” serving as an important theoretical basis for accurate pattern differentiation. It applies the “externally contracted hidden pathogen” theory — centered on the view that “hidden smoldering heat qi (i.e., yin deficiency with internal heat, or accompanied by damp-heat) exists in the body first, and the subsequent contraction of pathogenic qi from heaven and earth is the root of warm-disease onset” — to the treatment of warm-disease-type conditions. It is adept at the diagnostic and therapeutic approach of “clearing heat, nourishing yin and resolving dampness, three methods considered together.” Its practice takes the form of clinical diagnosis and treatment by academic successors, expressed through pattern-based prescriptions, academic writings, teaching materials and plans, and related medicaments.

Judging the two mainstays first

Yin and yang as the overarching frame, within which all further differentiation and prescribing is done.

The six refinements

Interior and exterior, cold and heat, deficiency and excess refine the general yin-yang reading into checkable specifics.

Latent pathogen brought out by new invasion

The doctrine that heat disease begins with latent internal heat triggered by an external invasion — why febrile illness is held to arise from within.

Clearing heat, nourishing yin and resolving damp

Three methods used together rather than singly, addressing heat and damp in the same patient.

The Kong Bohua research studio

The institutional home for studying and publishing the family's learning, keeping the line active beyond the third generation.

Blending the cold and warm schools

A style that neither clings to cooling drugs nor to warming tonics, but prescribes by pattern and by constitution.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

The Kong Bohua family medical lineage is a traditional Chinese medical therapeutic method founded by the renowned physician Kong Bohua and passed down for generations within his family. It is distributed mainly in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and Shandong, and has a history of one hundred years to date.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

Kong Bohua made outstanding contributions to traditional Chinese medical clinical practice, academic transmission and personnel training: he led epidemic prevention in Langfang in 1918, pioneering public health and epidemic prevention in China; his work Bing Chuan Ban Ba Zhong Zheng Zhi Xi Yi (Analysis of Doubtful Points in the Treatment of Eight Kinds of Infectious Disease) is an important reference for the prevention and treatment of infectious diseases by traditional Chinese medicine; and he trained many descendants and disciples into renowned physicians, including internal medicine expert Kong Sibo, oncology expert Kong Lingxu, liver disease expert Wang Hongshi, and pediatrics experts Song Zuomin and Pei Xueyi. The Kong Bohua family medical lineage has a clear transmission lineage and has been passed down to the fourth generation to date. Its knowledge and skills are transmitted mainly through modes emphasizing clinical teaching, such as father-to-son instruction, master-to-disciple mentorship, oral and mental transmission, following the master on rounds, in-depth clinical study, and analysis of medical cases. At present, under the leadership of representative inheritors, Kong Bohua's academic successors are active in hospitals and professional institutions in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region and Shandong, promoting the project's transmission practice and social dissemination, and advancing research through the establishment of the “Kong Bohua Masters Research Office,” with multiple academic works published. The Kong Bohua family medical lineage is an important component of traditional Chinese medicine culture. Its distinctive “externally contracted hidden pathogen” theory is especially suited to modern patient groups whose disease arises from yin deficiency and damp-heat hidden pathogens caused by diet, emotion and sleep; its experience and practice in warm-disease treatment are of important value for the prevention and treatment of infectious diseases belonging to the warm-disease category, such as SARS, avian influenza and influenza A (H1N1). Having been transmitted for a hundred years and having trained generations of renowned physicians, it has played an important role in the history of modern traditional Chinese medical transmission and education. Protecting this intangible cultural heritage is of positive significance for carrying forward Chinese medicine culture, advancing the public health cause, and benefiting the broad masses of the people.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

TCM Diagnostic and Therapeutic Methods (Zhaoyang, Beijing) · China ICH Official Project Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗

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