Chinese herbal medicine can be traced back at least 3000 years.  With this ancient lineage of knowledge, Chinese herbal medicine is one of the world’s oldest and most long-standing health care systems. The herbal tool kit in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is a large one, including more than 450 commonly used substances. A large majority of these medicines are from plant origins but TCM also uses animal and mineral substances. Some medicinals are common to us in our cooking endeavors, such as mint, cinnamon, ginger and garlic, and some are found in our flower gardens such as peony and chrysanthemum flowers.  Many substances are of Chinese origin or are unfamiliar to most people and have names like dang gui, chai hu, shu di huang and huang qi.  These Chinese medicinals are either prescribed alone or combined with one others to create a well-balanced formula of multiples substances.  The beauty of Chinese medicine formula making is that your TCM practitioner can create and prescribe you a customized medicine that considers all of your own unique health issues and symptomology.  As your condition changes and improves, the Chinese herbal treatment is also adjusted and modified until the desire health outcome is achieved.