Formulas · Warm the Interior 溫裏 · Uihak Immun (醫學入門)

White Freeing Decoction

Baektong-tang

한글 백통탕 · Pinyin Bai Tong Tang

白通湯

The white of the name is the scallion white. Named in the 薑附湯 entry as that formula with the aconite used raw, though the composition here also includes the scallion.

Composition 構成

Geongang Gan Jiang
乾薑 건강 · Dried Ginger

12 g
Chief 君
Buja Fu Zi
附子 부자 · Prepared Aconite

—
Chief 君

half a root, raw · toxic
Chongbaek Cong Bai
蔥白 총백 · Scallion White

—
Deputy 臣

three stalks
Dongbyeon Tong Bian
童便 동변 · Child's Urine

—
Envoy 使

one hop, stirred in for reversal with agitation
Jeodamjeup Zhu Dan Zhi
猪膽汁 저담즙 · Pig Bile

—
Envoy 使

half a gallbladder's worth, stirred in for reversal with agitation

Total 12 g per packet (첩) · representative dosage — verify against source texts. Excludes 4 ingredients measured by count or used as a vehicle, shown as —.

Received this formula from your practitioner? Amounts shown here are classical reference values — granule and prepared products differ. Always follow your prescribed dosage and directions.

Actions 效能

Treats shaoyin disease with diarrhoea and a faint pulse
Frees the yang with raw aconite and scallion white

Indications 主治

Pattern-based

Yang collapse with diarrhoea and a faint pulse
Shaoyin cold with reversal and agitation

Biomedical correlates

Circulatory collapse with diarrhoea
Shock

Source text 原文

Donguibogam 東醫寶鑑

治少陰病下利ㆍ脉微. 乾薑三錢, 附子(生) 半箇, 葱白三莖. 右剉, 水煎服. 《入門》 ○少陰證下利ㆍ厥逆ㆍ脉不至ㆍ煩躁, 白通湯煎水和童尿一合ㆍ猪膽汁半枚服之. 《入門》

Translation

Treats shaoyin disease with diarrhoea and a faint pulse. Dried ginger, 3 don; raw aconite, half a root; scallion white, three stalks. Cut up and decoct in water. For the shaoyin pattern with diarrhoea, reversal counterflow, the pulse not arriving and agitation, decoct Baektong-tang and take it stirred with 1 hop of boy's urine and half a pig's gallbladder of bile. — Uihak Immun 入門 (Donguibogam · Han)

Clinical commentary 臨床

**This must not be prepared.** Raw aconite is cardiotoxic and the dose here is substantial. Set that aside and the formula is a well-reasoned piece of emergency pharmacy: raw aconite and dried ginger to force the yang back, scallion white to open the way for it, and then — for the worst case, where the pulse is absent and the patient agitated — boy's urine and pig bile stirred into the finished decoction. Adding two cold salty-bitter fluids to a formula of three hot drugs looks like a contradiction and is in fact the Shanghanlun's method for a yang that has broken loose: lead it down rather than drive it further. The agitation it answers is the terminal restlessness of shock. — Eui Young (Justin) Chung, L.Ac., Dipl. O.M.