Check-up with the Chinese traditional doctor

My friends Angela and Meng Deng have been trying to get pregnant for the past four months. Meng Deng’s mother is a bit overbearing and harasses Angela daily about why she isn’t pregnant yet and what’s wrong with her (typical Chinese mother-in-law behavior). As this harassment induces anxiety, it’s most likely hindering the process.

Angela has turned to a famed Chinese doctor to see if he can help in the fertility department. Supposedly he’s a famous doctor, especially in fertility, and patients come from as far as Shanghai to see him. The first time I saw Angela after she’d taken a dose of the medicine he’d prescribed, she appeared to be in a state of complete relaxation. At the time, I was a bit stressed out with final exams, grading and kindergarten – so I asked if I could come along on her next doctor visit. I was hoping that he could help me relax too.

The next week, I met up with Angela and we walked down numerous small streets and narrow alleys to reach the doctor’s office. We had to arrive two hours earlier than we expected to see him as there are no appointments and he’s quite popular. The “waiting area” is a long, narrow and dark hallway where we squished alongside other patients to wait for our turn. The doctor has two sessions – morning and afternoon. When he breaks for lunch, everyone must wait outside while they sweep the hallway. This leads to a bit of confusion when the afternoon session begins and people get snippy about who’s in front of whom. When the afternoon session began, we scrambled into the doctor’s office to wait our turn. There are about ten seats in the office for the first ten people in line and the rest wait in the hallway. As we’re all sitting there waiting, we get to watch and listen to each patient’s visit.

Angela translated for me, so I could hear each person’s problem and diagnosis. The doctor sits in a chair at a table and facing opposite is his assistant who scribbles out the prescriptions. The patient sits between the two and places their hand palm-up on a little pillow. The doctor feels the patient’s pulse on their wrist with his fingers. In Chinese medicine, it is believed that we have five separate pulses that can be read from the wrist. As the doctor is reading the pulses, he asks questions about her monthly cycle, what she eats and looks at her tongue. He dictates the prescriptions to the assistant and the whole process takes about 5 minutes.

Once the doctor is finished and you get the prescription, you bring it to the other side of the room where there’s a window connecting to the “pharmacy”. Chinese traditional medicine is natural herbs, seeds, parts of trees and animals. The “pharmacist” scoops herbs from different drawers, mixes your concoction of plants together and bags them. The herb cocktail is to be put into boiled water at home, simmered for about 20 minutes and strained into a cup for a nice, dirt-tasting tea taken twice daily. They give you enough for a week, and then you come back for a new prescription each week until you’re feeling better (or pregnant).


The whole shebang costs a mere 2 RMB for the appointment (about 25 cents) and 40 RMB for the medicine (about 6 USD).

I took the medicinal tea for the full week and noticed that I did feel slightly more relaxed than before. I decided not to return as it was so time consuming, but did accompany Angela yesterday for her weekly visit to take some pictures and keep her company while she and her mother waited. Angela has been visiting the doctor for 6 weeks now and no baby yet, but she is confident that the medicine is helping.


Angela and her mother