Snatch Back Life Powder (Cold chapter)

Talmyeong-san

한글 탈명산 · Pinyin Duo Ming San

奪命散

Registered with the chapter suffix to distinguish it from the three 奪命散 already on this site from other chapters, and from the 獨參湯 of the Sipyak Sinseo, which uses 2 nyang of ginseng with five jujubes and treats a different pattern.

Composition 構成

Insam Ren Shen
人蔘 인삼 · Ginseng

40 g
Chief 君

good quality, cut up

Total 40 g per packet (첩) · representative dosage — verify against source texts.

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

Supplements the original qi at the point of collapse
Rescues a ruined pattern on the verge of death

Indications 主治

Pattern-based

Ruined pattern of cold damage with clouding and sinking on the verge of death
Collapse after medicines given in error
Yin and yang patterns indistinguishable with the disease past its season

Biomedical correlates

Circulatory collapse in a debilitated patient
Iatrogenic deterioration in severe febrile illness

Source text 原文

Donguibogam 東醫寶鑑

治傷寒壞證ㆍ昏沉垂死, 或陰陽二證不明ㆍ過經不解, 及或因誤服藥ㆍ困重垂死一切危急之證. 好人參一兩, 剉, 作一服, 水二升, 於銀石器內煎至一升, 去滓, 以新水沉冷, 一服而盡. 汗自鼻梁上出, 涓涓如水, 是藥之效也. 一名獨參湯. 《丹心》

Translation

Treats the ruined pattern of cold damage with clouding and sinking on the verge of death; or where the two patterns, yin and yang, cannot be made out and the disease has passed its season without resolving; and all urgent patterns of heavy exhaustion on the verge of death brought about by medicine taken in error. Good ginseng, 1 nyang, cut up and made into one dose; decoct in 2 seung of water in a silver or stone vessel down to 1 seung, strain, sink it in fresh water to cool, and take the whole at one draught. Sweat comes out from the bridge of the nose, trickling like water, and this is the medicine taking effect. It is also called <span class='sochu'>Doksam-tang</span> 獨參湯. — Dansim 丹心 (Donguibogam · Han, lower)

Clinical commentary 臨床

One drug, a full nyang of it, decocted in a silver or stone vessel and then cooled before drinking — and every part of that is deliberate. A nyang of ginseng in a single dose is four to ten times an ordinary one; the vessel is specified because iron was held to spoil ginseng; and the cooling is the 從治 principle of the upper part's 2.66, a warming drug given cold so that a patient at the end of their strength will take it. The indication is the honest part: a ruined pattern, or a patient collapsing from medicines given in error, where nobody can tell any longer whether the picture is yin or yang. When the diagnosis has failed, the Bogam's answer is to supplement and nothing else. The sign of effect it names — sweat trickling from the bridge of the nose — is oddly specific and has no obvious physiological reading, but as a thing to watch for it at least gives the prescriber an endpoint. — Eui Young (Justin) Chung, L.Ac., Dipl. O.M.