Merging Ayurvedic Ashwagandha with Traditional Chinese Medicine Part 1. Foundation in Ashwagandha: Physiological Effects, Clinical Efficacy, and Properties

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has a methodical and organized system for the classification of herbal medicines. These classifications have been developed over many hundreds of years of careful observation and documentation of each of the traditional herbs and their effect on the human body. Due to isolation and long distances between different countries and cultures, certain significant herbal medicines (such as Ashwagandha from India) are not currently classified per TCM principles. The systems of Ayurveda and TCM are juxtaposed, herein, to establish a parallel between the two systems. In TCM, each herbal substance has its distinct attributes; therefore, a side-by-side comparison was made between each relevant herb and Ashwagandha. Because of this comparison, in the TCM herbal classification system, Ashwagandha can be categorized as “Tonify Qi” and “Tonify Blood and Essence”. This comparison, depicted in (Table 1), provides evidence to classify Ashwagandha in TCM accurately and establishes a methodology by which other relevant herbal medicines can be joined with Chinese medicine and classified under TCM categories and terms.