The skills of the four diagnostic methods of traditional Chinese medicine

"Look": Don't wear lipstick or scrape your tongue

" Visual diagnosis " mainly refers to doctors obtaining information related to diagnosis through vision. Consciously or unconsciously concealing one's own appearance will affect the results of the doctor's visual diagnosis and lead to misdiagnosis. Today's makeup art can easily deceive the real with the fake. For example, a sallow complexion is originally a manifestation of spleen deficiency, but after facial makeup, the rosy complexion may cause doctors to misdiagnose correctly; lipstick can make a patient with pale lips due to yang deficiency look like a "normal person" with harmonious qi and blood. Don't wear makeup before seeing a doctor. This will allow the doctor to see the real you and help with diagnosis.

"Looking at the tongue" is an important part of Chinese medicine's visual diagnosis. Doctors hope to see the patient's true tongue coating and tongue color. Some patients try hard to scrape the surface of their tongue with a toothbrush when brushing their teeth in the morning, with the aim of showing a beautiful tongue to the doctor. However, this makes it difficult to diagnose the disease clearly and inaccurately. Different colors of tongue coating represent different diseases. For example, yellow tongue coating indicates heat syndrome, and grayish-black and moist tongue coating indicates cold syndrome. If the patient drinks a can of orange juice or strong coffee before seeing a doctor and dyes his tongue coating yellow or grayish-black, misdiagnosis of heat syndrome or cold syndrome may occur.

In addition, when observing the tongue, some patients often stretch it out long and pointedly so that the doctor can see more comprehensively. However, they do not know that no matter what color the tongue is, if it is stretched too tight and too pointed, it will turn into a red tongue representing heat syndrome. When sticking out your tongue, you should be relaxed and natural, with the tongue fully extended and one-third of its length sticking out of your mouth.

Smell: Don’t chew gum or suppress your cough

"Olfaction diagnosis" is a method in which doctors judge diseases based on the smell and sounds made by the patient. Perfume or chewing gum will mask the patient's smell. In addition, the strength of the sound made by the patient is also very useful for the diagnosis of the disease. Do not deliberately exaggerate or suppress your own voice. For example, when treating a cough patient, do not cough loudly for fear that the doctor cannot hear you, nor do you have to hold back from coughing and have tears in your eyes.

Patients should be aware that, although physicians have a professional ethics obligation to treat all patients equally, dirty body odor is something no one wants to smell. In addition, it also includes the smell of alcohol, chewing garlic, etc.

Q: Don’t just say “heat” or “weakness”

"Medical interview" is a diagnostic method in which doctors listen to what patients say. Pay attention to highlighting the key points, and do not use general words such as "heat", "poor digestion", "general discomfort", or "feeling weak" to answer the doctor's first question.

When the doctor asks you where you feel uncomfortable or what help you need, you should use clinical symptoms (such as headache, general fatigue, etc.) or objective signs (such as fever, rash) to accurately describe your condition. When the doctor asks how long these conditions have lasted, many patients in Guangzhou always answer with the same word, "for a long time," regardless of how long the illness has lasted. When asked again, they still say "for a long time," and they refuse to say how long it has been using years, months, or days. It's really frustrating.

After describing the above complaints, the patient should tell the doctor the occurrence, development, changes, treatment process, medication, and treatment results of the disease in a concise and accurate manner, without adding too many adjectives. Patients should also tell their doctors about their past medical history, family medical history, and personal special conditions (allergic medications, special dietary preferences, etc.). Female patients should also provide additional information on menstruation and pregnancy if necessary.

When the doctor asks more questions, answer truthfully according to the objective situation. Sometimes "yes" or "no" is sufficient. For elderly patients with poor memory or patients with complicated medical conditions, it is a good idea to write down their medical conditions on paper.

Cut: Don't walk fast or wear a dress before seeing a doctor

The last step is “palpation”, which mainly involves taking the pulse and touching various parts of the body. Walking quickly will affect the pulse, so it is best to rest outside the clinic for a few minutes before seeing a doctor. Breathe evenly and relax your muscles when taking the pulse. At the same time, the examination of some diseases requires palpation of the chest and abdomen, so female patients should not wear dresses to facilitate the examination.