The amount of water added to traditional Chinese medicine decoctions should be determined based on the properties, volume, water absorption, and the required therapeutic dose of the medicine. If too much water is added, the concentration of the medicine will be too low and there will be too much decoction, which will affect the efficacy. If too little water is added, not only will the effective dose of the medicine not be extracted, but it is also easy to burn the medicine.
Three Methods of Water Addition
1. Traditional Method
Put the Chinese medicine in a pot and flatten it with your hand. Then add water until it is two finger widths above the medicine. This method is the simplest and most commonly used, but it is slightly less accurate.
2. Measuring Cup Method
Use a measuring cup to add water. Generally, for the first decoction, add 500-700 milliliters, and for the second decoction, add 300-350 milliliters. This method is more accurate and convenient than the traditional method, but if there are medicines with a large dosage, the amount of water added may be insufficient.
3. Weight Method
After preparing the Chinese medicine, weigh the total weight of the medicine. Then, according to the principle of adding 10 milliliters of water per gram of Chinese medicine, add 65% of the calculated total water volume to the first decoction, and leave the remaining 35% for the second decoction. For example, for a tonic medicine called Ren Shen Yang Rong Tang, with a total weight of 150 grams, 1500 milliliters of water should be added. 65% of the water, which is 975 milliliters, should be added to the first decoction, and 35%, which is 526 milliliters, should be reserved for the second decoction. This method is accurate in water addition and is particularly suitable for large quantity of medicines and large herbal medicine bags. Although it is more troublesome than the previous two methods, it is still recommended to use.
In addition, if there are a lot of flowers (such as Chrysanthemum, Pouch Flower, etc.) and leaves (such as Mulberry Leaves, Loquat Leaves, etc.) in the medicine, a little more water can be added.
Can hot water be used to decoct Chinese medicine?
Some patients often like to use hot water to decoct the medicine before boiling, thinking that this can make the decoction faster and more thorough. In fact, this is unscientific. When hot water is poured into the raw medicine, the outer layer of the raw medicine tissue will suddenly be subjected to a high temperature impact, causing it to immediately solidify and contract. Especially, proteins will form a layer of irreversible denatured layer on the cell wall, hindering the penetration of water, and the dissolved components inside the tissue will also be difficult to permeate, greatly affecting the dissolution rate of the effective ingredients of the medicine. Therefore, hot water should never be used to decoct Chinese medicine.
