Stress-related mental illness brought on by a reaction to fierce competition and heavy social pressures is not just something new to be suffered by modern citizens. New research has revealed that a Chinese imperial physician named Gu Dingfang described this kind of social disease early in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). Historical records have been revealed showing he offered treatment based on theories of psychology.

Gao Yuqiu is engaged in research into ancient medicine at the Shanghai University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and has made an in-depth study of funerary objects found in the Dapuqiao, Shanghai tomb of Gu Dingfang and his wife excavated in 1993. Gao has also researched ancient texts in support of her investigations.

Gao's discovery not only fills a gap in the medical history of the Ming Dynasty, but also takes its place in the world's history of the study of psychology.

However even though Gu Dingfang was an imperial physician in Ming Dynasty, there was not a word to be found about him in Chinese medical history prior to this exciting new research. Being a gifted man and a son of an illustrious family, Gu Dingfang was recommended for his appointment as an imperial physician at the age of 49. During his 14-year tenure in the post he worked at advancing medical theory instead of just blindly following the ancients. He was rewarded many times by Emperor Jiaqing.

Gu made some unique observations about the root causes of mental illness and did so long before modern medicine. He pointed out that psychological pressures caused by life in an imperial environment of fierce competition and mutual deception coupled with extreme social pressures can result in diseases, which would sometimes prove fatal.

He cited the example of imperial officials, resolute and unfettered by scruples in their upward climb. Driven by greed for promotion and over-expectation they suffer such internal turmoil that they presented with such symptoms as apoplexy and convulsion.

Furthermore, Gu Dingfang would not only observe his patients and make a diagnosis but he could also offer an insight on what had caused the disease and how it developed. It was his view that continuous periods of mental pressure could have an influence on what he described as the main and collateral channels of the nervous system, which could lead in turn terrible diseases.

The historical records show Gu Dingfang acting with the same moral integrity and clinical qualities that would be expected of a present day doctor of psychology. His method of treatment was reported as often involving conducting a conversation with the patient during which his words and indeed the strength of his character would have a beneficial effect on the illness. He established a rapport with his patients and his methods proved to be rather successful. His brand of psychotherapy was so popular in the Jiaqing period of the Ming Dynasty that from emperor to ministers everyone liked to go to him for consultations and he was highly praised.

According to Gao Yuqiu, when compared with modern Western psychology founded by Sigmund Freud only at the end of 19th century, Gu had realized the importance of psychology much earlier, in the mid 16th century.

Gu wrote that the first priority is to cure patients by psychological means. Next in importance is to tackle the patients' symptoms. For him any other form of treatment was not even worth mentioning. It showed great foresight indeed to identify mental illness as a quite separate condition to organic illness so early in the development of world medicine. The records of his work fully demonstrate that Chinese medicine was leading the world in the field even though Gu's discovery was not fully understood and acknowledged by his colleagues at the time.

(china.org.cn by Zheng Guihong, September 19, 2002)