TCM Herbal Medicine Database (Herbs That Start With "Z")

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) offers an extremely valuable, rich, lengthy, and extensive herbal treatment history. Within it are thousands of years of development and research which we benefit from greatly today. As opposed to some forms of herbalism and western medicine, Chinese herbs are often used in formulas instead of being used singularly in larger amounts. Formulas allow you to blend herbs to enhance their positive effects and reduce or eliminate any negative side effects they may have. These formulas take years and years of practice to master and many are kept within families and or generations of teacher-student transmissions. This rich tradition is a very valuable gift from previous generations.

The true benefit of this herbal tradition, as with acupuncture, is that it allows practitioners to blend formulas to match each patient and their signs and symptoms exactly. Instead of having a standard formula for a particular condition you can increase the clinical effectiveness of the herbs through this tailoring. For the patient this ideally means faster results with less side-effects.

Our Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) herbal database contains usage information for the majority of the herbs used in clinical settings around the world. Listed within this section are individual herbs, however, in clinical treatment settings you would most often combine these into formulas for usage. The herbs listed here may be ground into powders and put into capsules, cooked into teas, used topically, taken raw, etc. You should never attempt herbal treatment without proper training as some of the herbs are toxic and need to be prepared correctly and others can have side-effects without being used in proper amounts and/or mixed properly into appropriate formulas.

You may view the individual herbs by clicking on the first letter of the Chinese Name or by searching through other groupings such as by channel, properties, or functions & actions (which also contains summary/study notes for each grouping).

This section is very much a work in progress, so please check back if you are not finding the herbal information you are looking for.

Herb Name	Functions and Usage
Zao Jiao (Chinese Honeylocust Fruit, Gleditsia)	Dispels phlegm - phlegm nodules, coughing with copious but difficult to expectorate sputum, strongly dispels phlegm. Opens orifices and revives the spirit - sudden loss of consciousness with facial paralysis or seizures due to excessive phlegm. Dissipates clumps and reduces swellings.
Zao Jiao Ci (Spine of Honeylocust Plant)	Reduces swellings, discharges pus, invigorates blood, reduces abscesses - for early stages of swollen sores to encourage suppuration or to burst. Expels wind, kills parasites - leprosy and ringworm.
Ze Lan (Bugleweed)	Promotes movement of blood and menstruation - pain due to blood stasis obstructing menses, post partum abdominal pain from stasis. Invigorates blood and dispels blood stasis - topically and interally for pain and swelling from traumatic injury or abscess. Promotes urination - post partum edemc or lin, systematic or facial edema.
Ze Xie (Water Plantain Root)	Promotes urination, drains damp-heat in the lower burner - urinary difficulty, edema, diarrhea. Drains deficient kidney fire - heat signs, dizziness, tinnitus.
Zhe Bei Mu (Fritillaria Bulb)	Clears and transforms phlegm-heat - acute lung heat with productive cough. Clears heat, dissipates nodules (better than Chuan Bei Mu - for phlegm-fire congealing and causing neck swellings, lung and breast abscesses and swellings.
Zhen Zhu (Pearl)	Sedates the heart - tremor, palpitations, seizures, childhood convulsions. Clears the liver - blurred vision. Promotes healing, generates flesh - ulcers of the gums or throat.
Zhi Gan Cao (Honey Fried Licorice Root)	This preparation increases the qi tonifying aspects of the heart and spleen along with its general harmonizing function within formulas. See Gan Cao for complete information.
Zhi Ke (Ripe Fruit of Zhi Shi)	Milder actions - move qi and reduce distention (good for weak patients).
Zhi Mu (Anemarrhena Rhizome)	Clears heat, drains fire - high fever, irritability, thirst, and a rapid flooding pulse in patterns of excessive heat in the lungs and/or stomach; cough due to lung heat with thick yellow sputum. Nourishes yin, moistens dryness - deficiency of lung and kidney yin, night sweats, steaming bone disorder, irritability, afternoon or low-grade fevers, bleeding gums, five-center heat; also for kidney heat signs - spermatorrhea, nocturnal emission, high sexual desire. Generates fluids and clears heat - oral ulcers and inflammation due to yin deficiency, wasting and thirsting disorder.
Zhi Shi (Immature Bitter Orange)	Breaks up Qi stagnation, reduces accumulations, transforms phlegm - epigastric or abdominal pain and distention or indigestion w/focal distention or gas. Directs qi downward and unblocks bowels - frequently used for abdominal pain and constipation by accumulation and stagnant Qi. Transforms phlegm and expels focal. Used with Qi tonifying herbs for the prolapse of organs. Raises blood pressure.
Zhi Yuan Zhi (Honey Fried Senega Root)	This is the honey fried version of Yuan Zhi. See the Yuan Zhi page for more usage information.
Zhi Zi (Cape Jasmine Fruit, Gardenia)	Clears heat (Heart and Liver), eliminates irritability - heat patterns with fever, restlessness, insomnia, delirium, stifling sensation in the chest. Drains damp heat - lin (urinary dysfunction) syndrome due to damp-heat in the lower warmer, damp-heat and constrained liver and gallbladder causing jaundice, damp-heat in the gall bladder and triple heater channels of the face - eyes, nose, sores in the mouth and face. Cools the blood, stops bleeding - nosebleed, blood in vomit, stool, urine; (needs to partially charred). Topically for blood stasis due to trauma, reduces swelling.
Zhu Ling (Polyporus Sclerotium)	Promotes urination, drains dampness - edema, scanty urination, cloudy painful urination, vaginal discharge, jaundice, diarrhea.
Zhu Ru (Bamboo Shavings)	Clears and transforms phlegm-heat - thick sputum, stifling sensation in the chest, coughing up blood. Clears heat from the stomach, stops vomiting (good choice for different types including morning sickness), aversion to heat, bad breath, yellow greasy tongue. Cools the blood and stops bleeding - to stop nosebleed and vomiting of blood.
Zhu Sha (Cinnabar)	Sedates the heart, calms the spirit - restlessness, palpitations, anxiety, insomnia, convulsion. Clears heat, relieves toxicity - carbuncles, sore throat.
Zi Cao (Groomwell Root)	Clears Heat, Cools the Blood, Relieves Fire Toxicity while Venting Rashes. Encourages rashes to surface, often for fire toxin with very dark purple rashes. Topically. Clears damp heat, damp heat skin lesion, vaginal itching, burns. Moisten Intestines, Unblock Bowels. Heat in the blood with constipation.
Zi Hua Di Ding (Yedeon's Violet)	Clears heat and fire toxicity - hot swellings, red, swollen eyes, throat, and/or ears; mumps. Clears hot sores - sores and abscesses of the head and/or back.
Zi Ran Tong (Pyrite)	Dispels blood stasis and promotes healing of bones and sinews - swellings due to trauma, fractures.
Zi Su Ye (Perilla Leaf)	Release the exterior, disperse cold - wind-cold w/fever Resolve qi stagnation, open chest - vomiting, nausea Calm restless fetus - morning sickness Seafood poisoning - alone or in combination w/other herbs
Zi Wan (Purple Aster Root)	Relieves cough and expels phlegm - important herb for stopping coughs of various etiologies, especially chronic, cold induced cough with copious sputum that is difficult to expectorate, or of blood streaked sputum. Frying in honey enhances the moistening function of the lungs and stops cough.
Zi Zhu (Callicarpa Leaf)	Stops bleeding, both internally and externally - particularly useful for blood in the urine. Treatment of burns and sores.
Zong Lu Pi (Trachycarpus Stipule Fiber)	Binds and stops bleeding - coughing of blood, blood tinged sputum, nosebleed, blood in the stool, uterine bleeding.