Summer is a busy season for many patients: holiday trips, outdoor parties and less-structured daily routines. These common characteristics of summertime often lead to predictable health imbalances which, if prepared for, can be easily remedied.
While the heat of summer can be a catalyst for a wide array of heat-related issues, as I've discussed in my past several columns, let's focus on three other predictable patterns that are extremely common due to the previously mentioned summer activities: digestive discomfort, summer colds / flu and fatigue.
For Digestive Discomfort: Bao He Wan or Jian Pi Wan
During the summer months, it is extremely common for patients to eat heavier meals, which tend to be more protein / fat based due to outdoor grilling and barbecues. This is often combined with alcoholic drinks and larger portions as well. In these cases, the pattern of food stagnation is extremely common and predictable.
The TCM formula / patent medicine Bao He Wan is a perfect fit for such issues. Bao He Wan resolves food stagnation, harmonizes the stomach, descends the stomach qi, clears heat, dispels damp, and promotes overall digestion. This wide range of actions makes it a perfect formula for common summertime digestive challenges.
Bao He Wan is particularly effective for excess-type issues resulting from the consumption of heavy, fatty, high-protein foods. It is also an important formula / patent medicine for patients who take over-the-counter antacid medications, which essentially stop digestive symptoms, but do not improve overall digestive capability.
In these cases, patients may not suffer or feel digestive discomfort due to the medication, but still continue to overeat food. This leads to the TCM pattern of food stagnation, often with stomach heat. Supplements such as probiotics or digestive enzymes may not target root issues.
If patients have celiac disease or gluten sensitivity, the patent medicine Jian Pi Wan can easily be used as a substitute, as Bao He Wan does contain wheat products. Jian Pi Wan resolves food stagnation, harmonizes stomach and spleen, descends stomach qi, tonifies spleen qi, and promotes overall digestive capacity. (Unfortunately, Jian Pi Wan does not clear heat, so if heat issues are apparent, an appropriate formula / patent medicine can be used in combination.)
For Summer Colds / Flu: Huo Xiang Zheng Qi San
It is extremely common for patients to suffer from cold / flu issues during the summer season. TCM excels at therapeutic options in such scenarios. Patients also tend to ignore and mistreat summer patterns of wind cold / wind heat; as a result, these issues can linger and become low-grade chronic issues if left untreated.
My favorite formula for patients to have on hand during the summer months for such potential challenges is Huo Xiang Zheng Qi San. This formula / patent medicine dispels pathogenic factors, resolves the exterior, clears summer heat and dispels damp, dispels turbidity, descends the stomach qi, harmonizes the middle jiao, and relieves diarrhea. This wide-ranging list of clinical actions makes this formula / patent medicine extremely unique in its therapeutic application.
Patients who experience summer colds / flu with constitutional digestive deficiency can recover rapidly if this formula is administered in the early stages of symptoms; patients who experience "stomach flu" can also experience rapid relief.
Huo Xiang Zheng Qi Wan can be combined with Bao He Wan or Jian Pi Wan in cases of food-borne illness or overall digestive issues present concurrently with wind cold / wind heat patterns. I cannot overemphasize the clinical importance of this formula / patent medicine in the contemporary clinic!
For Summer Fatigue: Sheng Mai San
The busy pace of summer traveling, combined with increased physical activities in the heat, commonly results in fatigue during the summer months. Physical activity in extreme heat can cause excess sweating, resulting in the loss of qi and eventually blood deficiency. In such cases, the formula / patent medicine Sheng Mai San becomes an important remedy.
Sheng Mai San tonifies qi, nourishes and astringes yin, generates fluids, benefits the lungs and heart, and stops sweating. In patients with constitutional yin deficiency, this formula is an almost-perfect fit for the summer season.
I also use this formula for athletes who train month after month in the summer heat, leading to fatigue coupled with lung or heart irregularities – which their primary care physician is often unable to explain. In cases of extreme fatigue due to chronic exposure to hot climates, I combine Sheng Mai San with the single medicinal Xi Yang Shen / American ginseng, typically in capsule or tea form, to more deeply tonify the qi, nourish the yin, clear lung heat, and generate fluids.
I hope you are inspired to educate your patients on potential summer health challenges and the most effective remedies for quick resolution of predictable summer patterns. These three important TCM formulas / patent medicines are a great place to start!
Editor's Note: This is the third article in a short series on dealing with summer challenges using acupuncture / TCM. Read "Preparing for Summer: Calming the Fire" in the June issue (under Craig's Planetary Herbalism column) and "Surviving Summer: Acupoint Combinations" under his On Point column (July issue).
Click here for more information about Craig Williams, LAc, AHG.