BY HEINER FRUEHAUF

In the Chinese medical tradition, deliberations about the origins and treatment of stroke related conditions span over more than two millennia. Since the condition has traditionally been considered to be one of the "four major problems in internal medicine" (neike si dabing), stroke chapters occupy a prominent place in virtually all of the works that make up the defining body of traditional Chinese medicine.Beginning with the Huangdi Neijing (Inner Canon of the Yellow Emperor), a variety of stroke symptoms were described in great detail, but there was at that time no single label or category which established a concise Chinese term for the condition.