The Genius of China: 3,000 Years of Science, Discovery, and Invention by Robert Temple

Author:Robert Temple [Temple, Robert]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Use of Thyroid Hormone

(Seventh Century ad)

Goiter is an enlargement of the thyroid gland, seen as a swelling in the neck. By the seventh century ad at the latest, the Chinese were using thyroid hormone to treat goiter. This practice may have started earlier, but in the seventh century Chinese physicians described the technique in writing. The first, Chen Ch’üan, died in 642 ad. His book, Old and New Tried and Tested Prescriptions, which some attribute to his younger brother, Chen Li-yan, gives three uses for the hormone obtained from thyroid glands of gelded rams. In one prescription, he recommends that the physician wash one hundred thyroid glands in warm water, remove the fat, dry them and chop them up. He should then mix them with jujube dates and make them into pills to be swallowed by the patient.

In another prescription, he suggests that a single thyroid gland be removed from a sheep, the fat taken off, and the gland put raw into the mouth. It should be sucked by the patient until all the juice possible has been extracted and swallowed. Then the gland itself should be eaten.

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