Formulas · Drain Dampness 利水滲濕 · Gogeum Uigam (古今醫鑑)

Chicken Sweet-Wine Drink

Gyerye-eum

한글 계례음 · Pinyin Ji Li Yin

雞醴飮

Composition 構成

Gyesi Ji Shi
雞屎 계시 · Chicken Droppings

600 g
Chief 君

乾雞糞一升, dried chicken droppings, parched yellow, approx: true
Jeolla Tian Luo
田螺 전라 · Rice-field Snail

—
Envoy 使

田螺二枚, two rice-field snails, to stop the purging

Total 600 g per packet (첩) · representative dosage — verify against source texts. Excludes 1 ingredient 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 water swelling and qi swelling and damp swelling alike
Turns the abdomen over and brings the water out below

Indications 主治

Pattern-based

Water swelling with a full abdomen
Qi swelling and damp swelling

Biomedical correlates

Historically used for ascites and generalized oedema
Recorded for historical reference only

Source text 原文

Donguibogam 東醫寶鑑

雞屎, 治水腫ㆍ氣腫ㆍ濕腫皆效. 乾雞糞一升炒黃, 好淸酒三椀淬下, 煮作一椀, 濾去滓, 令飮之. 少頃, 腹中大轉動作鳴, 從大便利下, 於膝脚及臍上下先作皺起, 其腫漸消. 病未盡, 再服一劑. 以田螺二枚, 滾酒淖熟食之卽止, 名雞醴飮. 《醫鑑》

Translation

Chicken droppings treat water swelling, qi swelling and damp swelling, and are effective in all of them. One seung of dried chicken droppings parched yellow, quenched in three bowls of good clear wine, boiled down to one bowl, strained of its dregs, and given to drink. After a little while the abdomen turns over greatly and rumbles, and it passes out below through the stool; the knees and legs and the skin above and below the navel wrinkle up first, and the swelling gradually subsides. If the illness is not finished, take a second dose. Two rice-field snails, parboiled in boiling wine and eaten, stop it at once. It is called Gyerye-eum. — Uigam 醫鑑 (Donguibogam · Bujong)

Clinical commentary 臨床

**This must not be prepared.** Chicken droppings carry salmonella, campylobacter and much else, and parching them does not make them food. What makes the entry remarkable is the observation rather than the drug: 於膝脚及臍上下先作皺起 — the skin of the knees and legs and around the navel wrinkles first, and then the swelling goes down. That is a correct description of oedema resolving, written by someone watching a patient closely over hours. The two snails at the end are an antidote, given to stop the purging once it has gone far enough, and a stopping rule like that is rarer in this literature than it should be. — Eui Young (Justin) Chung, L.Ac., Dipl. O.M.