Abstract:

Having been used for over 5,000 years in Asian countries, traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has emerged as a highly sought-after alternative treatment option both during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. This article provides an overview of TCM, covering its history and roots in culture and philosophy, core concepts and theories, definitions of terms used in TCM, and examples of TCM being used in clinical settings. Both traditional Chinese and English versions of the titles of each TCM publication, along with the names of TCM theories, modalities, and key concepts, are provided.

This review is divided into two sections and has five components overall. Part 1 includes the following elements: the summary, the history of TCM, core concepts and theories of TCM, and definitions of acupuncture, moxibustion, and acupressure; part 2 includes the summary, definitions of the rest of TCM modalities and TCM clinical application examples. This is the part 1 of the review.

Keywords: Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), acupuncture, acupressure, long-COVID, neurological disorders, qi.