5 Ways Traditional Chinese Medicine Can Benefit The Elderly

July 21, 2022

Have you ever thought about how Traditional Chinese Medicine can help you or your elderly ones age comfortably? As we get older we get the pleasure of new and different experiences. However, we also have to endure a few unpleasant changes within our bodies.

These physical changes may change the way we get to experience our world. That is why it is worth looking into reliable preventative measures, such as TCM. Start planning your healthcare now with these tried and true treatments.

Acupuncture For Arthritis Pain

Arthritis is one of the most common ailments people develop as they age. Symptoms appear and diagnoses can be given as early as the age of 40. Acupuncture is one method to help manage these symptoms.

An acupuncture therapist follows the Chinese Medicine meridian body chart, which can tell them which pressure points or nerves in your body relate to the pain you are feeling. There is also a focus on the qi (pronounced chi, a.k.a energy), which when blocked from flowing can develop uncomfortable feelings in the body.

Regular maintenance will help keep pain and discomfortab at bay. This means seeing your therapist every few weeks before the pain returns in full.

Herbal Medicine For Blood Pressure

“Gastrodia Elata, Uncaria, Abalone shell, Eucommia Ulmoides Oliv…” just to name a few of the herbs popularily used for treated hypertension. Now, these herbs probably don’t sound familiar and you definitely won’t find them in the vitamin section at your local drug store. But don’t worry, your Chinese Herbalist will know exactly what these are and what to do with them.

Depending on it’s ingredients and purpose, herbal blends come in a few ways:

  • Blended and ground for capsules
  • Mixed for steeping as herbal tea
  • Combine in whole for moxibustion (More on that soon!)

Herbal blends can be anything from flowers, grasses, and weeds to barks and spices.

Improve Blood Circulation with Cupping

Blood is essential to our body for delivering oxygen to all our limbs and organs. Although, as we age, numerous factors can effect how efficiently blood travels throughout the body. This may cause numbing in limbs, and in severe cases cause organs to function less than perfect, sometimes ceasing proper function entirely.

Cupping can be used generally or to target specific areas, for example a limb  with loss of feeling. Your practitioner may even prefer following the meridian chart to achieve results.

However they choose to go about it, your practitioner will place glass and silicone cups which pull on the skin. This signals the body to rush blood to that area for healing. With the right amount of cups in treatment, you can be feeling better after a single treatment.

Increased Mobility With Tai Chi

The practice of Tai Chi can be gentle and beginner friendly. It is all about creating movement in the body to create the flow of energy. From a physiological point of view, it is great for mobility!

Getting into this structured and disciplined practice early – meaning before it becomes difficult to move – is a great way to age gracefully. Many adult Chinese men and women take a few minutes out of each day to perform a few Tai Chi moves to re-energize from their daily tasks.

Moxibustion for Alzheimer’s

Moxibustion is a method that isn’t yet scientifically proven (although, many studies take place!), it holds it’s reputation by it’s years of practice. Most practitioners believe that moxibustion is a viable preventative for Alzheimer’s disease.

This may be due to the way the herbs react with neurons in the brain, heightening our senses after a draining lifestyle – or calming our nerves, breaking the stress cycle after traumatizing incidents.

Conclusion

Either way, we’re always getting older! Might as well explore our options for making the process of aging a smooth transition. Traditional Chinese Medicine can be quite beneficial for the elderly. What better place to turn than one of the oldest medicine practices we know.

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