Refute the rumor! Why is rheumatism called 'rheumatism'? Is it caused by wind and humidity?

Rheumatism is an imported word, a translation of the English medical term rheumatism, or rheumatic diseases.

What kind of disease is rheumatism?

In fact, rheumatism is not a disease, but a big basket in medicine, including more than 100 diseases involving the invasion of joints, bones, muscles, blood vessels and related soft or connective tissues, most of which also involve the heart, skin , kidneys, lungs and other tissues and organs, generally belong to autoimmune diseases.

Among them, the vast majority of rheumatism involve or are accompanied by various arthritis, therefore, rheumatism can often refer to Arthritis.

This should be the fault of early medical translators, just like the translation of psychology, which has nothing to do with "heart", into "psychology" and the translation of cholera into "cholera", it is a language borrowing that is wrong.

We know that translation is the mutual interpretation and expression between two languages, and language itself is a cultural symbol, and different languages ​​have different cultural backgrounds.

In this way, language expressions based on one culture often cannot find corresponding words in the language of another cultural background, especially when a large number of new words appear after the development of modern science and medicine in the West, this phenomenon more serious.

When translators encounter such translation problems, one solution is to directly transliterate them and then explain them to become a completely imported new word; another solution is to find a word that is similar in meaning in the native language to translate.

Japan often adopts the former scheme when translating European things; while the early Chinese translators adopted the latter scheme, which caused problems such as rheumatism, psychology, cholera, etc. "words that don't make sense".

The root of rheumatism is Rheuma or humors, which is one of the body fluids in the ancient Indian medical theory of the three body fluids, or the ancient Greek medical four body fluid theory - mucus.

According to the theory of body fluids, if several body fluids in the human body are kept in balance, people can stay healthy; if the body fluids are not balanced, diseases will be caused.

Rheumatism is a disease caused by excess Rheuma in the body.

Therefore, in the West, Rheuma itself is not directly related to "wind and wetness".

But Chinese textbooks misinterpret this.

For example, Practical Internal Medicine says:

"The word rheumatism (rheuma) originated in the 4th century BC. The Chinese "Huangdi Neijing" (5th century BC) also called the combination of wind, cold and dampness as Bi. Because rheumatism mostly involves joints and causes pain, so rheumatism is a The words are still in use today.”

Some domestic literature further explains:

"In the 4th century BC, the "Complete Works of Hippocrates" said in the article on human anatomy: the body fluids of the human body bet on the limbs and internal organs due to the dampness and coldness, causing diseases, which is rheumatism.

However, we can not find such a narrative from foreign historical documents about rheumatology.

As for why the translator coined the word "rheumatism", the explanation given by "Practical Internal Medicine" is still reasonable.

Because, as mentioned above, rheumatism basically involves bone, joint and muscle problems, which is consistent with some "arthritis" in traditional Chinese medicine, and some of the causes of arthralgia are believed to be caused by "wind and dampness" as external evils.

For example, "Internal Classics: Yin and Yang Yingxiang Da Lun Chapter 5": "The dampness of the earth, the feeling will damage the skin, muscles, tendons and veins."

"The Tenth of the Five Poems" also said: "When lying out and the wind blows, the blood coagulates on the skin is paralysis."

"Bi Lun Chapter Forty-third" further states: "Wind, cold and dampness are mixed together, and they are combined to form Bi. The prevailing wind energy is Xing Bi, the cold air prevailing is Pain Bi, and the dampness prevailing is Paralysis. "

In this case, why not directly translate it into "paralysis"?

Because "Bi" has been paralyzed - nerve paralysis preemptively occupied.

Of course, this translation is also very in line with our folk "wisdom". According to our logic, "old cold legs should naturally be caused by wind-cold", "rheumatoid arthritis (there is no such disease in medicine) every cloudy day Or the cold is especially painful." That's right and proper.

As mentioned above, rheumatism is a big basket containing at least more than 100 diseases. The etiology, pathogenesis and pathology of each disease are different. Naturally, there is no “uniform” reliable treatment.

Therefore, if you suspect that you have "rheumatism", you need to receive a doctor's diagnosis and targeted treatment.

It should be pointed out that "rheumatism" is mostly related to autoimmune reactions, so almost no disease can be cured.