Traditional Chinese medicine is Chinese medicine, which is relative to Western medicine. Before Western medicine was introduced to our country, there was no term "TCM". Previously, "TCM" had many names: Qihuang, Qingnang, Xinglin, Xuanhu, Jujing, etc. Each name is associated with an interesting story. For example, the first name of "TCM" "Qihuang" comes from the "Huangdi Neijing". "Huangdi Neijing" is a book in which Huangdi discussed medicine with Qibo, who was known as the "Tianshi". Later generations called the medicine in "Huangdi Neijing" "Qihuang's Technique". "Huangdi Neijing" is a classic of early Chinese medicine, so "Qihuang" has become synonymous with traditional Chinese medicine; another example is the little-known "Jujing", which tells the story of Su Dan, a Taoist priest in the Western Han Dynasty. Su Dan was extremely filial to his mother. Before he became an immortal, he told his mother that there would be an epidemic of plague. Drinking well water soaked in orange leaves could prevent and cure it. The epidemic broke out the next year, and his mother used this method to treat countless patients. In order to commemorate its merits, later generations used "Jujingquanxiang" to praise traditional Chinese medicine.
The word "traditional Chinese medicine" was first seen in "Hanshu·Yiwenzhi" written by Ban Gu of the Eastern Han Dynasty. There is a saying in it: "If a disease is not cured, it is often treated by traditional Chinese medicine." It means that people who are sick are not treated, but they often recover on their own because they conform to medical principles. This does not mean that we should carry the disease without treatment, but emphasizes the importance of the body's own regulation to health. The human body often achieves a balance of yin and yang through self-regulation, so illnesses are often cured without medication. This is the secret of traditional Chinese medicine: to achieve the purpose of treating diseases and saving lives by regulating various mechanisms of the human body to achieve balance. The “TCM” we are talking about now only appeared around the time of the Opium War. At that time, the Western doctors of the British East India Company named Chinese medicine "TCM" in order to distinguish between Chinese and Western medicine. In 1936, the Kuomintang government formulated the "Regulations on Traditional Chinese Medicine", officially naming Chinese medicine as "Traditional Chinese Medicine" in legal form. People also call it "Han Medicine", "Traditional Medicine", "National Medicine", etc.