Dogwood Fruit
(shan zhu yu)
Fructus
Corni
Properties:
Sour, astringent in flavour, warm in nature, it is
tropistic to the liver and kidney channels. Being warm and
moist in nature, it functions in tonifying both liver-and
kidney-yin and warming kidney-yang; and as an astringent,
it is also good at consolidating and astringing the
lower-jiao and serves as an important herb for reinforcing
the kidney to preserve essence. Thus it can be used
together with other herbs to treat syndromes of debility
of the lower-jiao due to insufficiency of the liver and
the kidney.
Effects:
Invigorating the liver and kidney, keeping kidney essence,
reducing urination, and checking perspiration and
hemorrhage.
Indications:
1. For
insufficiency of kidney-yang induced debility of the
lower-jiao manifested as spermatorrhea and frequent
urination. it is often used with herbs for invigorating the
kidney o preserve essence such as Fructus Psoraleae,
Sement Astrgali Complanati, Semen Euryales, Radix
Rehmanniae Preaparata. Rhizoma Dioscoreae, etc. For
lassitude of the loins and knees, dizziness, tinnitus,
night sweat, and spermatorrhear due to deficiency of both
liver-and kidney-yin, it is often used with Radis
Rehmanniae Preaparata, Rhizoma Dioscoreae, Cortex Moutan
Radicis, as in Rehmannia Bolus of Six Ingredients (Liuwei
Dihuang Wan).
2. For deficiency
of Chong and Ren Meridians with menorrhagia, netrorrhagia
and metrostaxis, it is often prescrided with drugs for
curing metrorrhagia and leukorrhagia such as Radix
Astragali seu Hedysari, Rhizoma Atractylodis Macrocephalae, Os Sepiella seu
sepiae, etc.
3. For night sweat
due to Yin-deficiency and spontaneous sweating because of
Qi-deficiency, it is often prescribed with drugs for
consolidating the superficies to stop sweaing, such as Os
Draconis Fossilia Ossis Mastodi, Concha Ostreae, Fructus
Tritici Levis, Fructus Schisandrae, etc.
Dosage and
Administration:
6-15g; 30g
used in large dosage.
