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In his Yixue Zhongzhong Canxi Lu he created the Yidu Pill featuring Eucommia in large dosage, and questioned the ancient practice of char-frying to 'sever the threads'.

Story

Zhang Xichun (1860–1933), courtesy name Shoufu, of Yanshan in Hebei, was a standard-bearer of the modern school integrating Chinese and Western medicine. The essay 'On the Treatment of Lumbar Pain' in his Yixue Zhongzhong Canxi Lu systematically sets out his understanding of and clinical experience with Eucommia—a representative modern clinical document on the drug.

The Yidu Pill he devised uses Eucommia heavily at four liang to tonify the Du Vessel and strengthen the lower back and kidney—'taken for about a month, the condition cures itself'. Especially commendable is his courage to question the millennia-old processing dictum that 'Duzhong should be fried until its threads break': he pointed out that the Eucommia gum threads do not break even when fried to charcoal, so processing need not insist on severing the threads—raw Eucommia fried yellow suffices. This empirical spirit, starting from the drug's physical reality, happens to coincide with the modern scientific understanding that Eucommia contains gutta-percha.

Milestones

• A native of Yanshan, Hebei; practiced medicine in Cangzhou and Tianjin during the Republican era and founded the Lida Hospital of Chinese Medicine
• Skilled at treating bi-syndrome lumbar pain; over forty years of practice he consistently used Eucommia, Dipsacus, and walnut kernel to tonify the kidney
• His Eucommia-containing formulas—modified Huoluo Xiaoling Dan, Yidu Pill, and others—are still widely used today for lumbar and leg pain

Key Contributions

• Authored Yixue Zhongzhong Canxi Lu (Records of Heartfelt Experience in Medicine with Reference to Western Medicine, published in installments 1918–1934), one of the most influential modern works of Chinese clinical medicine
• Created the Yidu Pill (Du-Vessel Benefiting Pill) for kidney-deficiency lumbar pain, with four liang of Eucommia (wine-soaked and fried yellow) as sovereign drug, combined with Cuscuta seed, Dipsacus, and deer-horn glue
• Proposed that 'all lumbar pain arises along the spine, which the Du (Governing) Vessel truly governs; those with kidney deficiency necessarily have deficiency of the Du Vessel', making Eucommia the key Du-entering drug
• On practical grounds questioned traditional processing: 'investigating it, even when Duzhong is fried to charcoal its threads still do not break; such a method is truly unsuitable', advocating that raw Eucommia fried yellow suffices