Abstract:
Chinese medicine has accumulated rich experience in the prevention and treatment of epidemic diseases over the ages, and has formed a complete system for it, among which the external treatment method is a distinctive aspect. This study incorporates a total of 75 formulae on external treatment for the prevention and treatment of epidemic diseases, which have the following characteristics: ①Naming mostly featured by "bi wen (preventing plague)" and "sha gui (killing ghosts)" to highlight the role in preventing epidemic diseases; ②Formulation featured by lozenge, moxa stick, joss stick, medicinal cake, and other 11 types in addition to the common pill, powder and decoction; ③Application method featured by fumigation, wearing, coating, powdering, nose blowing, sneezing, bathing, eye dropping, and other external methods; ④Medication featured by mainly pungent and warm medicines with a medication frequency above 5 out of 24 medicines, metal and stone medicines, aromatic medicines, and other 176 medicines. In addition, there are also some rare medicines, which are worthy of further study and utilization.