Integration of Chinese Medicine and Western Medicine

In China, Western medicine has been considered a form of alternative medicine for several hundred years. However, until 1919 AD, traditional Chinese medicine, which includes massage, herbal medicine, acupuncture, and self-care practices (Qigong), was the primary system of medicine. In the 18th and 19th centuries, some Western medical practices were available, mostly through missionaries. In 1919, when the last emperor stepped down, a number of Western medical schools were established in China, but it took until the 1990s for Western medicine to be fully integrated into the overall medical delivery system. Now, the alternative, Western medicine, has been almost completely integrated into China's mainstream system of medical practice, which is still strongly founded in their traditional system.

Today, there are few clinical situations in China where either traditional Chinese medicine or Western methods are delivered alone. For example, in many rural clinics, acupuncture, herbal medicine, and massage are easy and inexpensive to deliver, but Western medicine is difficult and expensive to provide. A few specialty institutions in large cities exclusively use technological Western diagnostic methods, and follow up with primarily Western intervention procedures. However, most institutions that focus on Western methods typically have acupuncture, massage, and herbal medicine also available to reduce pain, mediate the side effects of medications, and support patients with regulation of sleep, bowel disturbances, pain, anxiety, and nausea.

The extent to which the Chinese have absorbed "alternative medicine", that is, conventional Western medicine, into their system, is quite remarkable. It is apparent that the Chinese are proud of this collaborative, complementary, and comprehensive model. They have so completely embraced the alternatives to traditional Chinese medicine-surgical and drug based procedures-that all residents of Chinese cities have complete access to both.
One might wonder whether Chinese traditional physicians and Western physicians cooperate, and are they equally respected and equally compensated?

Everyone in China makes approximately the same monetary wage: physician, teacher, administrator, bus driver, clerk. The public holds equal respect for all physicians, whether Western or traditional. Patients may have a bias based on specific experiences, but both traditional medicine and Western medicine are equally available and paid for through government resources.

Physicians who make the professional choice to adopt either traditional Chinese medicine or Western medicine tend to have strong biases. However, many physicians have trained in both areas. These individuals are quick to express the benefits of both approaches, in spite of their final choice to practice primarily one or the other.  Click to learn how Chinese medicine treats Behcet's Disease.

Two examples:
Dr. Zhu is a very bright, female physician who is the chief of the Oncology Department (called "head of tumor section" in China) at the Shanghai Ear, Nose & Throat Hospital. During an interview she spoke very much from the perspective of a Western trained physician. However, she was very interested in discussing her beneficial collaboration with the Shanghai branch of the Cancer Recovery Association, whose members practice traditional Qigong self-care exercises daily. In addition, her own special research interest is in the physiological mechanisms of acupuncture.

Dr. Liu, the chair of the Department of Acupuncture at the Zhejiang College of Traditional Chinese Medicine, was trained in Western medicine. During the cultural revolution, he was assigned to a project aimed at proving or disproving the traditional claims made about the benefits of Qigong self-care exercises. His research demonstrated that Qigong self-care was very beneficial. He decided to pursue the traditional approach to medicine, specializing in acupuncture and Qigong. Now, as the chair of the department and as chief editor of several books on current acupuncture research, Dr. Liu is very active in the merging of traditional Chinese and Western medicine.