Abstract
Purpose: Dysmenorrhea mostly depends on the causative factor, which usually falls under the categories of Deficiency and Excess pattern in traditional Oriental medical theories and diagnosis. Thus, we investigated menstruation symptom and sign related to dysmenorrhea and verified the validity of Deficiency and Excess pattern identification. Methods: We investigated menstruation symptom and sign related to dysmenorrhea in total 14 gynecology-medical books including the book ${\ll}$Exemplar Of Korean Medicine (Dongui Bogam)${\gg}$ and whole body symptom and sign identifying Deficiency and Excess pattern at the same time. A survey based on this investigation was carried out targeting women of childbearing age. Results: Total of 14 gynecology-medical books have mostly narrated pre-menstrual and mid & post-menstrual pelvic pain depending on the time of its manifestation for identifying Deficiency and Excess pattern. Dysmenorrhea in pre-menstrual period belonged to Excess pattern and dysmenorrhea in mid & post-menstrual period belonged to Deficiency pattern. Among a total of 343 women, 196 subjects suffered from dysmenorrhea. The number of dysmenorrhea in pre-menstrual period (Excess pattern) was 116 people and in mid & post-menstrual period (Deficiency pattern) was 80 people. Deficiency and Excess pattern of dysmenorrhea in menstrual period significantly correlated to Deficiency and Excess pattern of whole body symptom and sign in the statistics(P-value < 0.05). Conclusion: The results suggest that pre-menstrual and mid & post-menstrual pelvic pain depending on the time of its manifestation is preferentially utilized as symptom and sign related to dysmenorrhea identifying Deficiency and Excess pattern.
