The Shanghan Lun (variously known in English as the Treatise on Cold Damage Diseases , Treatise on Cold Damage Disorders or the Treatise on Cold Injury) is a part of Shanghan Zabing Lun (. It is a Traditional Chinese medicine treatise that was compiled by Zhang Zhongjing sometime before 220 AD, at the end of the Han dynasty. It is amongst the oldest complete clinical textbooks in the world (cf. Carakasaṃhitā and the Hippocratic Corpus). It is considered one of the four canonical works of Traditional Chinese medicine, along with Huang Di Nei Jing, Jin Gui Yao Lue, and Wen Bing Xue.

Surviving editions

The Song edition is organized into ten volumes including the first two chapters on pulse diagnosis; Cheng's edition is also organized into ten volumes but simplified; Classic of the Golden Chamber and Jade Sheath is organized into eight volumes.

Contents

The Shanghan Lun has 398 sections with 113 herbal prescriptions, organised into the Six Divisions corresponding to the six stages or pathogenesis of disease, according to the international external relationships of Yin and Yang: