Difficulty in defecation, dry mouth and bad breath, and constipation in summer are caused by excessive stomach heat.
Summer is one of the seasons with high incidence of constipation, and many middle-aged and elderly people suffer from constipation in summer. Especially after entering the dog days, the weather gradually becomes hot and dry, and the human body is more prone to water shortage. Coupled with modern people's less exercise, irregular diet, insufficient rest time, excessive fatigue, etc., the number of constipation is rising sharply.
Modern medicine believes that constipation is not only an independent disease, but also a symptom that often appears in the process of various acute and chronic diseases. It is mainly due to the dysfunction of large intestine conduction, which is characterized by difficulty in defecation and prolonged defecation time or interval.
The prevalence of constipation in the population is as high as 27%, but only a small number of constipation patients will see a doctor. Constipation can affect people of all ages. Women are more than men, and old age is more than youth and prime of life. Because of the high incidence of constipation and complicated etiology, patients often have a lot of distress, which will affect the quality of life when constipation is serious.
Many people don't treat constipation as a disease, but think it is a sub-healthy state. In fact, long-term constipation has a serious impact on the body and must be taken seriously. Long-term constipation will cause abdominal distension, loss of appetite, bad breath, etc. due to harmful substances produced in the body, and dry stool will cause anal canal skin laceration, which can be followed by bacterial infection, forming anal fissure, hemorrhoids and rectal ulcer, increasing the incidence of rectal cancer.
Chinese medicine believes that constipation is caused by many factors, and its location is in the large intestine, which is closely related to the spleen, stomach, lung, liver and kidney. In the pre-Qin period, it was recognized in Huangdi Neijing that constipation was related to cold in the spleen and stomach, heat in the intestine and renal diseases. Later, Zhang Zhongjing had a comprehensive understanding of constipation, put forward the different pathogenesis of cold, heat, deficiency and excess, and established the treatment methods of different types of constipation, which established the basic principles for later doctors to treat constipation.
In summer, especially in the dog days, people are prone to sweating. In addition, many people are used to gathering with friends at night, eating barbecues, drinking beer and eating cold and spicy food, which can easily make the turbid gas in the stomach and intestines not be discharged in time, and the internal heat will hurt the body fluid, which will eventually lead to constipation caused by heat.
The secret of heat is mostly caused by excessive stomach heat, injury to body fluid, and loss of moist intestine. If you often eat something spicy and fat, sweet and greasy, it will help the fire to generate heat and accumulate too much heat in the stomach. If the residual heat is not solved, it will linger on the stomach and intestines, resulting in burning body fluid, loss of fluid transmission, inability to moisten the large intestine, dryness of the intestine, and the combination of heat and dregs, which will make defecation difficult and form a heat secret.
it's like the water in a river is dried by the sun, and the ship in the river is stranded without water. Therefore, the heat secret is mainly manifested as dry stool, abdominal distension and abdominal pain, dry mouth and bad breath, red face and upset, or feeling very hot, less urine and yellow color. It is more common in young people, people who are physically strong and like to eat spicy, fried and roasted meat.
In addition, Su Wen Wu Zang Lun says: "The soul gate is also the envoy of the five zang organs, and Shui Gu cannot hide for a long time." It is clearly pointed out that constipation is a large intestine disease, but it is related to all five internal organs.
Spleen is the first of all yin, which is derived from Shui Gu's subtlety and turns into yin fluid, which is the source of acquired yin fluid. The conduction of the large intestine depends on the normal function of the spleen in ascending stomach and descending stomach. If the spleen is deficient in spleen-qi, the qi is not ascending, and the essence is not distributed, the stomach and body fluid are deficient, and the intestines are dry, so that dry feces remain and it is difficult to knot.
Therefore, if you overeat spicy food, it will lead to the accumulation of fiery evil in the stomach, which will lead to the loss of body fluid. Excessive loss of body fluid will lead to the imbalance of qi and blood, the blood deficiency of body fluid will not moisten the large intestine, the intestinal tract will be dry, and the promotion will be weak, which will cause difficulty in defecation. Just as the temperature is too high in summer, after the sun is exposed, the water in the soil is evaporated, which will cause the land to crack and harden. When there is heat in the body, it will naturally dry the water in the intestines, and the intestines will become dry without water, and the elimination of feces will become more difficult.
In addition, if the pathogenic fire goes up, it will cause symptoms such as dry mouth, bad breath, thirst and excessive drinking, and even chapped lips. This is also the reason why many patients with heat secrets are accompanied by dry mouth and bad breath.
Besides the stomach and intestines, lung heat can cause constipation. The main physiological functions of the lung are to propagate and descend. The lung controls the water channel, that is to say, the body fluid distribution mainly depends on the function of the lung. The lung and the large intestine, one dirty, one fu-organ, one yin and one yang, not only have meridians intertwined to form an exterior-interior relationship, but also have physiological coordination. "On Blood Syndrome" states: "When the lung moves to heat in the large intestine, it will be bound; when the lung fluid is not moist, it will be bound; when the lung qi is not lowered, it will be bound."
The lung is a delicate organ, which is not cold-resistant and heat-resistant. In summer, summer heat is in full swing, and with the popularization of air conditioning, people are vulnerable to external evils. If wind and heat attack the lungs, or wind and cold are depressed and turn into heat, it will be confined to the lungs. Lung heat will lead to the impairment of the descending function of the lung and the damage of body fluid, which will lead to the lack of body fluid in the large intestine and lead to dry stool.
Many patients with constipation will use "purgation" to treat constipation. However, as early as the Jin and Yuan Dynasties, Li Dongyuan emphasized that laxatives should not be used indiscriminately for constipation. For example, it is said in "The Secret Collection of the Blue Room: Dry Stool Door": "Generally speaking, we should not use croton and Petunia to treat diseases, which will damage the body fluid, and the dryness will get worse and worse, and then it will get worse and worse, and even lead to the next one, and it will be impossible to save."
Therefore, TCM usually adopts the method of clearing heat and relaxing bowels, but it should not be paranoid about purging fire and relaxing bowels, and should also give consideration to nourishing yin and consolidating the foundation. Sanren decoction is a commonly used prescription for clearing heat and promoting diuresis in clinic. On the basis of this prescription, it can also be used to treat chronic constipation caused by damp-heat. This prescription takes Amomum villosum, Coix lachryma-jobi and Almond as the monarch. Almond has the power of relaxing bowels and promoting lung qi. Amomum villosum has a fragrant smell, which can eliminate dampness and smooth temper. Coix lachryma-jobi can clear away heat and promote diuresis, so that damp heat will come out with urine. When the three factors are combined, the evil of damp-heat can be solved from the upper, middle and lower triple energizer. Taking fly talc, Magnolia Officinalis, Pinellia ternata, Akebia, and bamboo leaves as minister drugs. Fly talc can clear away damp-heat, while Akebia manshuriensis and bamboo leaves are lightly infiltrated to remove dampness, while Pinellia ternata and Magnolia Officinalis are used to remove dampness. The above four ingredients are used together to help remove dampness and heat, assist monarch drugs and improve curative effect. Modern pharmacological research also shows that almond, nutmeg and coix seed all contain various oil substances, which have good laxative effect.
It should be emphasized that among many constipation patients, only a few patients will choose to go to the hospital for medical treatment, and most of them will choose to take drugs by themselves or take other remedies. Such as steaming bananas across the water, drinking honey water on an empty stomach, boiling water with lotus leaves and mulberry leaves, and so on. However, most of these methods only play a role in relieving constipation, and cannot cure constipation.
Chinese medicine pays attention to dialectical thinking. There are many syndromes of constipation, and the viscera involved are different. Some methods are not symptomatic, which not only fail to work, but may also aggravate constipation. Therefore, when constipation occurs, you need to consult a professional doctor to treat it according to syndrome differentiation and prescribe the right medicine.