Chinese Medicine 
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Health Therapies Gua Sha Chinese Medicine
Gua Sha 刮 痧 The Forgotten Gem of Chinese Medicine.
Gua sha is a simple and effective technique used to treat muscle tension and pain, as well as respiratory illness. It speeds up the rate of recovery, and often prevents further more complex treatment being needed. It can be used alone or as part of an acupuncture treatment or herb consultation.
Gua Sha (刮痧), literally means "to scrape away fever", and more loosely, "to scrape away disease by allowing the disease to escape through the skin". It is an ancient medical treatment that has been used by practitioners of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and by lay persons in Asian folk medicine. In Vietnamese medicine it is called cạo gió, which means to "scrape wind", and refers to the idea of catching a cold being described as "to catch wind". In Indonesia the Javanese folk technique is called kerikan (lit., "scraping technique") or kerok, and refers to a similar method used in the home.
Gua Sha can help in the following ways:
Effective at treating muscle and tendon injuries: from injury or chronic overuse.
Treats stiffness, pain, immobility: especially tightness of the neck and shoulders.
Used for cough and dyspnea: bronchitis, asthma, emphysema and other Respiratory illness.
Used to reduce fever (the technique was used to treat cholera).
Treats fatigue caused by exposure to heat (often used to treat heat-stroke) or cold.
Increases the flow of Blood and Qi to treat sluggish circulation, fibromyalgia.
Treats headaches: migraine, occipital headache
Treats sunstrokes / heat syncope and nausea.
Treats digestive disorders.
Treats urinary, gynecological disorders.
Assists with reactions to food poisoning.
Gua Sha involves repeated pressured strokes over lubricated skin with a smooth edge. Commonly a Chinese soup spoon was used, or a well worn coin, even honed animal bones, water buffalo horn, or jade. The smooth edge is placed against the pre-oiled skin surface, pressed down firmly, and then moved down the muscles or along the pathway of the acupuncture meridians, along the surface of the skin, with each stroke being about 4-6 inches long.
This causes extravasation of blood from the peripheral capillaries and may result in sub-cutaneous mild blemishing, which usually takes 2-4 days to fade. Sha rash does not represent capillary rupture as in bruising, as is evidenced by the immediate fading of petechiae, and the rapid resolution of sha as compared to bruising. The color of sha varies according to the severity of the patient's blood stasis -- which may correlate with the nature, severity and type of their disorder --appearing from a dark blue-black to a light pink, but is most often a shade of red. Although the marks on the skin look pink or, they are not felt. Patients typically feel immediate sense of relief and change in muscle tension and pain, and often have increased mobility.
Gua Sha is often described as "folk" medicine, and this emphasizes the fact that Gua sha is extremely widely used in Asia as a domestic technique as a method of first-contact intervention, and that complex medical diagnosis is not required, and that Gua Sha is a safe technique. It is also a specialist technique used by practitioners of Chinese Medicine. Often westerners have not heard of Gua sha before because it is simple and often done at home, and therefore its widespread importance in Chinese Medicine is overlooked. As it is used as first intervention, its use often prevents further complex medical treatment from being necessary.
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