title: Comparison of sasang constitutional medicine, traditional chinese medicine and ayurveda.
abstract: Sasang constitutional medicine (SCM), traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and Ayurveda are three different forms of Asian traditional medicine. Although these traditions share a lot in common as holistic medicines, the different philosophical foundations found in each confer distinguishing attributes and unique qualities. SCM is based on a constitution-based approach, and is in this way relatively more similar to the Ayurvedic tradition than to the TCM, although many of the basic SCM theories were originally derived from TCM, a syndrome-based medicine. SCM and TCM use the same botanical materials that are distributed mainly in the East Asian region, but the basic principles of usage and the underlying rationale are completely different from each other. Meanwhile, the principles of the Ayurvedic use of botanical resources are very similar to those seen in SCM, but the medicinal herbs used in Ayurveda generally originate from the West Asian region which displays a different spectrum of flora.
authors.affiliation: Korea Institute of Oriental Medicine, 483 Exporo (461-24 Jeonmin-dong) Yuseong-gu, Daejeon 305-811, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jong Yeol
authors.initials: JY
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: Duong Duc
authors.initials: DD
authors.lastname: Pham
authors.forename: Byung Hee
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Koh