What is Southern Medicine (Thuốc nam)?

Southern Medicine - "thuốc" means "medicine" and "nam" means "south" or "southern" - is synonymous with indigenous Vietnamese medicine. In Vietnamese history and culture, the word "nam" evokes what pertains to Việt Nam and the Vietnamese, while "bắc" (which means "north) is associated with China. Southern Medicine is comprised chiefly of folk recipes that use local, tropical flora and fauna. Over the centuries, many of these ingredients have proved effective in treating certain diseases. For instance, the hòe flower (sophora japonica) is a good source if vitamin B. The flowers of frangipani (đại), which grow on the grounds of temples and pagodas, have anti-hypertensive properties. Lotus seeds are thought to have a sedative effect.

Moxibustion, a method of stimulating acupoints on the human body with burnt moxas (a kind of medicinal plant), was probably used in Việt Nam for the first time in the third century B.C., before the introduction of Chinese medicine. In ancient Việt Nam, Southern medicine always remained the main medical resource because local medicinal ingredients were available and cheap and considered more appropriate for the Vietnamese constitution. Local experts jealously guard some very effective therapeutic formulas. Families who practise folk medicine hand these formulas down form generation to generation.

General Trần Hưng Đạo, victor over the Mongol invaders in the thirteenth century, had a large plantation at Kiếp Bạc, his resistance base; there, he ordered his staff to grow indigenous medicinal herbs for his troops. Nowadays, many national parks boast a medicinal plantation, and alomost collective or individual. Urban resident often grow medicinal plants for decorative, culinary, and medical purposes.