Phenomenological Mechanism of Inspection in Traditional Chinese Medicine

Inspection is the crucial process to gain the physical condition of a patient before diagnosis and treatment in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Unlike the completely objective description of a patient in Western Medicine, the subjective thinking of the medical practitioners is comprised of TCM inspection. What’s more, Master of Chinese medical practitioner (CMP) could make a diagnosis only with inspection and without self-ratiocinate and demonstrate the process. This article revealed how the knowledge and experiences instantly appear in a CMP’s mind when he/she makes an inspection with the methods and conclusions of phenomenological philosophy. When a CMP sees a patient, he/she can “see” the symptoms of a patient with the help of intentional intuition, which is synthesized of retention. On this basis, pathogenesis knowledge will be given by the way of passive association. This conclusion drawn from phenomenological philosophy offers a new road for many problems remained pendent in TCM diagnosis and treatment.