Why are the textbooks of traditional Chinese medicine mainly based on eight categories of syndrome differentiation?

Traditional Chinese medicine analyzes and summarizes diseases and syndromes in eight categories: yin and yang, exterior and interior, cold and heat, and excess and deficiency, thus providing dialectical methods for treatment. Distinguish the location of disease syndrome and the depth of disease potential from the outside to the inside; The essence of cold-heat syndrome differentiation; Distinguish between excess and deficiency and the ups and downs of evil; Yin and yang control the six classes, which is the general program of the eight classes. Because of its high generality and the common characteristics of other syndrome differentiation methods, the Eight Cardinal Differentiation plays an important role in syndrome differentiation treatment, is the core theory and basic method of TCM, and occupies a very important position in TCM.

Brief history:

Eight programs originated from Neijing in the Warring States Period, and put forward the concepts of cold and heat and excess and deficiency. In Treatise on Febrile Diseases in Han Dynasty, Zhang Zhongjing summarized and distinguished diseases and syndromes from four aspects: yin and yang, exterior and interior, cold and heat, and excess and deficiency. Wang Zhi in Ming Dynasty

Cold and heat in the exterior and interior of deficiency and excess yin and yang are called "eight characters for treating diseases"; Zhang Jingyue clearly put forward the theory that Yin and Yang are "two cardinal principles" and exterior, cold and heat, and excess and deficiency are "six changes". In the Qing Dynasty, Cheng Zhongling further elaborated the meaning of the eight cardinal principles, and proposed that the examination and treatment of syndromes were nothing more than cold and heat, excess and deficiency, exterior and interior, and yin and yang. Abstract of Modern Medicine (1897) put forward the word "Eight Classics". After 1949, with the establishment of the academic status of syndrome differentiation and treatment, the eight programs are the core position and important works in syndrome differentiation and treatment.

The use is fully affirmed.