Which are the most important pulse qualities?

tutor

A Western TCM practitioner wrote about pulse diagnosis in P.R. China:

"[i:76d8d43b79]When I was a student in China during that time (in the 1980's), the importance of pulse examination was deliberately played down by many of my teachers and clinical preceptors....I never had a teacher tell me a pulse was anything other than wiry, slippery, fast, slow, floating, deep, or fine...it seems that many modern Chinese TCM practitioners relegate pulse examination to a minor, confirmatory role...[/i:76d8d43b79]" ([b:76d8d43b79]Flaws B[/b:76d8d43b79], [i:76d8d43b79]The Secret of Chinese Pulse Diagnosis[/i:76d8d43b79], 1995 Blue Poppy Press, Boulder, CO. )

There seem to be a disagreement between TCM practitioners as to which pulse qualities are the most important ones.

[b:76d8d43b79]Gao De[/b:76d8d43b79] from the Academy of Traditional Chinese Medicine recommends the following list of 16 simplified pulse conditions:
superficial vs. deep;
slow vs. rapid;
empty vs. full;
overflowing vs. thready; and
minute, rolling, choppy, wiry, scattered, hasty, knotted, and intermittent. According to Gao De, "[i:76d8d43b79]mastery of these 16 basic single-feature pulse conditions, together with their possible combinations and their indications, is sufficient to meet the needs in clinical differentiation of syndromes[/i:76d8d43b79]". (These pulses are not exactly the same as the ones described in the Medboo Course B).

In the book [i:76d8d43b79]Chinese Herbal Science[/i:76d8d43b79] by [b:76d8d43b79]Hong-yen Hsu[/b:76d8d43b79] is said: "[i:76d8d43b79]The most important qualities for the physician to be able to differentiation are floating, sinking, slow, and fast[/i:76d8d43b79]." The other four pulse qualities listed in this book are: weak, solid, slippery, and full. (8 pulse qualities in total).

So, my question is:

Which pulse qualities are more important and which are less important for practicing TCM and, in particular, for practicing acupuncture?

Thank you in advance for your answer.

tutor

In fact, in outpatient clinic of traditional Chinese medicine, there won't be many chances for the practitioners to find too many types of pulses, and personally I think it's between 12 to 16. So, basically I agree with Prof. Gao De's opinion.
But I don't think 8 types of pulse are really sufficient, maybe for beginners it's essential to grasp these 8 types at the very beginning, but later one has to grasp much more.
There are different ways of translating the names of pulses, and personally I do think there should be better ways of the translation.

In my opinion, such pulses as [b:709bd54fb6]deep[/b:709bd54fb6] and [b:709bd54fb6]superficial[/b:709bd54fb6], [b:709bd54fb6]slow[/b:709bd54fb6] and [b:709bd54fb6]rapid, thready [/b:709bd54fb6](minute/fine) and [b:709bd54fb6]surging[/b:709bd54fb6] (possibly the equivalent to overflowing), [b:709bd54fb6]Xu-deficient [/b:709bd54fb6](empty) and [b:709bd54fb6]Shi-excess (full), tense, string-taut (wiry), rolling (slippery)[/b:709bd54fb6] and [b:709bd54fb6]hesitant (choppy)[/b:709bd54fb6], [b:709bd54fb6]tense, soft[/b:709bd54fb6], and various irregular ones are very essential and commonly encountered in clinic.

To feel the pusle is not only to know the quality but very important to know the stomach, root and vitality. I think we discussed alot about it before.

tutor

Thank you very much for your kind reply.

tutor