Today is World Health Day, and this year’s awareness theme is depression. The World Health Organization issued a press release on March 30, 2017, calling on everyone to “Come together to talk about depression” and focus on the health of people with depression. According to the latest WHO estimates, more than 300 million people worldwide currently suffer from depression; an increase of more than 18 percent from 2005 to 2015. The difficulty of getting support for people with mental disorders, along with the fear of stigma, prevents them from getting the treatment they need to lead healthy and productive lives. The worst consequence of depression is that it can lead to suicidal behavior, which is now the second leading cause of death among people aged 15-29.
The overall goal of the WHO’s “Let’s Talk About Depression” campaign is to make it possible for more people around the world who are depressed to seek and receive help.
Symptoms of depression
Depression, also known as depressive disorder, is characterized by significant and persistent depressed mood and is the main type of mood disorder. The main presenting symptoms of depression are.
① Depressed mood: Depressed mood is the most common and significant symptom of depression, which can be divided into two aspects: depressed mood and loss of interest. In the life of depressed patients, all are helpless and sad; when it comes to interest, patients often do not experience the joy of life, and people or things that used to be of interest gradually lose any meaning.
(2) Delayed thinking: Patients have slow thinking, slow reaction, closed thinking, and feel that their brains are like a rusty machine, and clinically they can see that their active speech is reduced, their speech speed is significantly slowed, their voice is low, and they have difficulty in answering questions.
(3) Willful depression: The patient’s willful activity is persistently inhibited. The clinical manifestations are slow behavior, passive and lazy life, not wanting to do anything, not far from the surrounding people, living alone behind closed doors, alienating friends and relatives, avoiding social life, and in severe cases, even disregarding physiological needs such as eating, drinking and personal hygiene, with a disheveled face, or even developing into silence, immobility and non-food, called “depressive lignocaine”. The more serious cases are often accompanied by negative suicidal ideas or behaviors.
④ Cognitive impairment: The main manifestations are decreased memory of recent events, attention disorder, prolonged reaction time, poor thinking ability, learning difficulties, poor language fluency, reduced eye-hand coordination and thinking flexibility, and unreasonable self-blame, exaggerating their own shortcomings, showing a cognitive unrealistic ideas, feeling that they are useless, useless, and have no hope for the future.
⑤ Somatic reactions: mainly sleep disorders, fatigue, weight loss, constipation, generalized pain, loss of libido, impotence, amenorrhea, etc. The physical complaints of somatic discomfort can involve all organs, such as nausea, vomiting, heartburn, chest tightness, sweating, etc.
Modern treatment means
To date, the etiology of depression is not clear, but it is certain that many aspects of the biological, psychological and social environment are involved in the pathogenesis of depression. The exposure to stressful life events in adulthood is an important trigger for the development of clinically significant depressive episodes. However, these factors do not act in isolation, and the interaction between genetic and environmental or stressful factors, and the point at which this interaction occurs, is now emphasized as having an important influence in the development of depression.
Currently, modern medical treatments for depression include.
① Pharmacotherapy: pharmacotherapy is the key. Therefore, a clear diagnosis, scientific and rigorous antidepressant medication is the key. In layman’s terms, depression is a functional and organic disease of the body’s mental endocrine system triggered by the external environment, and is a dysfunction of the brain, hypothalamus and autonomic nerves, to put it bluntly, it is a disease of the brain that manifests itself as abnormal mental and physical symptoms.
② Psychotherapy: through consultation with psychological counselors, parents, relatives and friends of love and support, so that patients can adjust their own mentality, etc.
③ Rest and recuperation: temporarily stay away from stress, for example, office workers temporarily stay away from work, students temporarily stay away from school, encourage patients to rest more, maintain adequate nutrition, and actively participate in physical exercise.
How Chinese medicine can help
Depression, which is classified as depression in modern Chinese medicine, is mostly a result of liver qi stagnation. According to Chinese medicine, the most basic substance in the human body is essence, blood, fluid and fluid, which are produced from the same source, and the spiritual activities of the human body are also based on this foundation. All spiritual activities are inseparable from the operation of qi, therefore, Chinese medicine classifies the pathogenesis of most diseases as unfavorable qi, either due to phlegm obstruction or blood stasis, which hinders the operation of qi. There are many types of adverse qi flow, including qi reversal, qi trapping, qi depression, etc. Depression is mostly thought to be liver qi depression.
Why is it liver qi stagnation and not heart qi stagnation or spleen qi stagnation?
According to Chinese medicine, the liver is the master of draining, and draining has a wide range of meanings, including regulating qi, and regulating emotional and mental activities. Therefore, many emotional diseases are also related to the liver. In addition, there are other causes, such as qi and blood deficiency (also known as heart and spleen deficiency), yin deficiency and fire are all deficiency to cause disease; there is also qi stagnation and phlegm stasis, these may lead to emotional depression. There is this saying.
Boredom is not sparse, the heart orifice is depressed and hot.
If you are depressed, your liver will be depressed and your soul will be guarded.
If depression is not evacuated, the kidney water is over-sunk.
Excessive lung qi, sorrow and sobbing.
Thinking too much, seal boredom in the continent.
The greatest treasure of TCM to improve depression is the holistic concept and discriminatory treatment.
Holistic concept
Chinese medicine is about the unity of heaven and man, specifically the harmony between man and society, man and nature. People should follow nature, which means, frankly speaking, to have more contact with society, to communicate with relatives and teachers, not to force oneself to do things that one does not like, to rest more, to go out more, and to actively participate in physical exercise, especially group physical exercise.
Another significance of the holistic concept of TCM is also to guide behavioral rehabilitation to focus not only on psychosomatic symptoms but also on other symptoms brought about by depression, such as loss of appetite, panic attacks, menstrual disorders, and impairment of social cognitive function. Treatment also goes beyond prescribing a few Chinese herbs or proprietary Chinese medicines, but also uses Chinese physical therapy methods such as acupuncture and tui-na, and provides guidance on practicing tai chi, recitation, physical exercise, food therapy, etc. Simply put, the holistic concept is to bring harmony between the inside and outside of a person, and to use holistic thinking to regulate the body’s functions and to relieve the causes of disease, not just limited to mental and psychological disorders.
Discriminatory treatment
With regard to treatment, TCM practitioners should first identify the evidence and then discuss the treatment. For different types of depression, TCM practitioners will use different remedies.
Liver-Qi stagnation type: Prosperity San, Prosperity Pill
Qi stagnation and phlegm stasis: Hanxia Houpu Tang
Depression: Gan Mai Da Zao Tang
Heart and spleen deficiency: Guei Spleen Tang
Yin deficiency and fire: Zhi Shui Qing Liver Tang, Zhi Bai Di Huang Wan
De-stressing the liver to eliminate depression
According to Chinese medicine, liver qi stagnation is mostly caused by the loss of liver drainage or emotional depression, by massaging the two wuwei, can achieve the effect of de-stressing liver qi. The massage of the two wounds can be carried out with the help of Sheng Yuan’s Gan Lin Qing Zi or Hui Zui Ben Cao’s Gui Pu Shu Dan, which helps to clear the liver and relieve depression. And pay attention to often press the body of the “Qi points”, such as.
Taichong point is soothing for people who are angry and depressed; with the foot three li, for constipation, diarrhea and stomach problems are improved.