subject: The alias disease: Epiphora [print this page] The alias disease: Epiphora The alias disease: Epiphora
The alias disease: Epiphora
Their location: Systemic
Attendance sections: Diseases of Canthi
Epiphora is a kind of lacrimation disorder which is caused by the condition that the drainage of tears is blocked and tears cannot flow into the nasal cavity. Clinically, the disease mainly shows, in the absence of obvious swelling and pain, constant or intermittent weeping with cold and thin tears and pertains to cold lacrimation disorders. It is classified, according to the clinical features, as the
irritated epiphora with cold wind and the constant epiphora.
Cause: Mostly, the disease arises as a result of anomaly of the palpebral margins and the obstruction or functional inefficiency of the lacrimal pathway.
From the clinical manifestations, the disease pertains to the "lacrimation troubles" in traditional Chinese medicine. Etiologically and pathogenically, deficiency of liver blood, abnormal thin dacryon and invasion of external pathogenic wind cause the irritated epiphora with cold tears, or the restraining failure of tears due to insufficiency of qi and blood or to deficiency of both liver and kidney
gives rise to the constant weeping of cold tears, or the perpetuating trachoma which has the dacryon invaded by pathogenic toxin leads to the stricture or obstruction of the lacrimal passage so that the tears overflow instead of osmosing downwards. Most cases of cold lacrimation are of deficient syndrome while most of irritated epiphora with cold tears are due to deficiency of eye and invasion of pathogenic factors, and both are of the mild conditions. On the other hand, constant weeping of cold tears mainly due to the visceral deficiency is of severe one. The latter often develops from the former.
Diagnosis: Main Diagnostic Points
1. Irritated Epiphora with Cold Wind
Usually, the affected eye suffers from no redness, swelling and pain, and from no weeping, too. But lacrimation occurs when the eye encounters the cold wind. Or, irritated by the winter and early spring wind, the eye is weeping with excessive cold tears. When being washed, the lacrimal passage is perfect in function or
functioning but not perfectly.
2. Constant Epiphora
The patient is always weeping all the year round and the condition is severe when meeting with wind. With the lacrimal sac being pressed, no mucus overflows from the dacryon. The lacrimal passage, when being washed, may be of constricture or blocked, or the eversion of the dacryon may exsist.
The TCM approach is fundamentally different from that of Western medicine. In TCM, the understanding of the human body is based on the holistic understanding of the universe as described in Daoism, and the treatment of illness is based primarily on the diagnosis and differentiation of syndromes.
TCM therapeutic approaches include acupuncture, acupressure, massage, herbal medicine, Tai Chi and Qi Gong, and cultivating healthy lifestyles and practices.
