Today, many curative and preventive institutions in the DPRK are applying fumigation, one of traditional therapies, to treatment and prevention of various diseases.
As an external treating procedure, the increasingly popular therapy is part of the Koryo cures. It treats diseases by exposing a region of the body to smoke or steam which comes out when medicinal plants are burnt or boiled, or by washing the region with their decocted water.
The therapy probably originated from the age-long sauna therapy.
Referring to sauna, an old document says: Stones are piled up to build a house, with the floor heated by fire. People sweat in it, inhaling the smell of the leaves of pine or thuja on the heated floor.
But sauna was not effective enough for treating diseases because it only causes sweating.
Korean ancestors came up with an idea of applying a fumigation method to overcome this shortcoming. They burnt or decocted Koryo medicinal herbs to generate smoke or steam for patients to expose a region to or inhale. This was an organic combination of sweating and medicinal effects.
Fumigation is applicable to treating internal, external, gynecological, dermatological and other diseases.
Merited Doctor Jang Jae Phil, head of the fumigation department of South Phyongan Provincial Koryo Medicine Hospital, spent over 20 years working on a study to scientifically account for the medicinal mechanism of fumigation and invent a fumigation treatment apparatus and a Koryo medicinal smoke inhaler, which make it possible to conduct systemic, local and inhaling treatment separately.
In the course of treating many cases with fumigation, he further identified and systematized the medicinal herbs and therapies for different symptoms. The results are on the national intangible cultural heritage list.
Yon Ok
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