Traditional Chinese Medicine Parenting: Question 16 - How should chronic illnesses in children be treated?

Traditional Chinese Medicine Parenting: Question 15 - How should chronic illnesses in children be treated?

Answer: The first step in treating chronic illnesses in children is to determine whether it is a true chronic illness or a false one.

A true chronic illness is typically the result of poor maternal habits during pregnancy, which can lead to an inadequately nourished fetus. Children born with such issues generally have weaker constitutions and are more prone to illness, often showing signs of kidney Qi deficiency. These conditions resemble chronic illnesses and require gradual postnatal care to improve the child's health by replenishing kidney Qi and ensuring smooth circulation of Yang energy, which will strengthen their constitution. This is what we refer to as a true chronic illness.

On the other hand, false chronic illnesses are mostly the result of improper treatment in Western medicine. For example, take a child diagnosed with so-called bronchitis. Each time it flares up, the child is taken to the hospital for nebulization therapy. The symptoms of bronchitis, such as coughing and asthma, are actually the body's way of expelling harmful substances through airway spasms. The cough helps to expel cold or heat pathogens. 

However, nebulization therapy essentially suppresses the spasms without addressing the root cause, leaving the pathogens inside the body. After a few days, when the child's Yang energy builds up again, the body attempts to expel the pathogens through coughing, leading to another round of nebulization therapy. This creates a vicious cycle and is not truly a chronic illness but rather a result of medical error. The same applies to conditions like chronic rhinitis.

In essence, treating a disease is binary: it's either curable or incurable. There is no such thing as merely controlling it. 

Understanding this concept reveals the falsehood behind the widely accepted notion that conditions like hypertension and diabetes require lifelong medication for control.