Overview of Vietnamese traditional medicine

Nowaday, in Vietnam there are two types of medical services which have coexisted. These are Western medicine or Tay Y and Eastern medicine or Dong Y (this is also known as Oriental medicine). Dong Y is includes Chinese traditional medicine (TCM) or Thuoc Bac and Vietnamese traditional medicine (TVM) or Thuoc nam. In its’ history, Vietnam was dominated by feudal China in more than 1000 years, so that Vietnamese people was impacted much by Chinese thought, culture and medicine of course. Traditional Chinese and Traditional Vietnamese Medicine differ in practice, though they share the same theoretical foundation. Their relationship can be observed by the influence of TCM theories on the TVM which are Yin and Yang, Five Elements. In practice, TCM practitioners usually spend more time giving their patients a sort of theoretical explanation of what's going on, whereas TVM practitioners would use a more practical approach and concentrate less on theory. TVM was popular in common life of working people, generally using ingredients readily available nearby and involving a minimum of processing. Most knowledge was passed unselfconsciously from one generation to the next. It can be said that Vietnamese people are based on theories of TCM and available tropical plant sand animals native to Vietnam to built and develop TVM with it’s own character. The following are some plants are using in normal life of Vietnamese people as food or drink with well-being effect(1,2).