Formulas · Transform Dampness 化濕 · Uihak Gangmok (醫學綱目)

Snail Mud Pill

Nani-hwan

한글 나니환 · Pinyin Luo Ni Wan

螺泥丸

Composition 構成

Jeolla Tian Luo
田螺 전라 · Rice-field Snail

—
Chief 君

the mud voided by live field snails kept in fresh water, dried on paper over ash

Total 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 stomach reflux

Indications 主治

Pattern-based

Stomach reflux with phlegm and damp

Biomedical correlates

Gastroparesis — historical treatment

Source text 原文

Donguibogam 東醫寶鑑

治反胃. 大田螺多取, 新水養之, 待吐出泥, 澄去淸水, 以灰鋪篩上, 用皮紙覆灰上, 傾此泥於紙上, 待半乾, 作丸梧子大, 每三十丸, 藿香湯呑下立愈, 名曰螺泥丸. 其螺放於水中, 殺食無效. 《綱目》

Translation

Treats stomach reflux. Take a quantity of large field snails and keep them in fresh water until they void their mud; pour off the clear water, spread ash on a sieve, cover the ash with a sheet of bark paper, pour the mud onto the paper, and when it is half dry make pills the size of a paulownia seed. Thirty pills each time, swallowed down with patchouli decoction, and the patient is cured on the spot. This is called Snail Mud Pill. The snails are to be put back in the water; killing and eating them has no effect. — Uihak Gangmok 綱目 (Donguibogam · Guto)

Clinical commentary 臨床

The one formula in the chapter's 單方 list, and the material is not the snail but what the snail voids after a day in clean water — essentially fine silt. The last line is the interesting one: the snails are to be returned to the water alive, because killing and eating them does nothing. That is a claim about the medicine being the mud and not the animal, and it is the sort of distinction the 單方 lists make when they have actually been tried. **Field snails are the intermediate host of several flukes and should not be handled or prepared this way.** — Eui Young (Justin) Chung, L.Ac., Dipl. O.M.