Do I need to drink the soup for decoction of Chinese medicine?

　　Traditional Chinese medicine is the treatment method chosen by many people, but it is difficult to swallow the bitter traditional Chinese medicine. In addition, the decoctioned traditional Chinese medicine contains difficult-to-digest substances. At this time, everyone will be confused whether to drink it all? Let’s take a look at it below:

　　In order to determine whether to take or discard the muddy sediment that appears at the bottom of the bowl after decoction of Chinese medicine, we will give a general introduction to the situations that may occur when coptis and licorice are co-decocted, so that you can make the right choice. Modern scientific research shows that the main active ingredients of coptis are alkaloids such as berberine, and the main active ingredients of licorice are glycyrrhizic acid, glycyrrhetinic acid and other acidic ingredients. These two types of ingredients have high solubility in water, so they can be dissolved from traditional Chinese medicine pieces when decoctioned with water. When the two medicines are decoctioned together, the berberine and glycyrrhizic acid that enter the water may meet in the water and form salts or complexes with low solubility in water. The fine granular solids are suspended in the decoction, making the decoction turbid. If the decoction is left alone, it may settle to the bottom of the bowl and form a muddy substance.

　　Some people have done experiments where coptis and licorice are decoctioned with water. If a larger amount of licorice is used and the resulting soup is left to clarify, the supernatant will be non-bitter, but the antibacterial effect will be greatly reduced. This shows that berberine, which has antibacterial effects and is extremely bitter, is precipitated to the bottom of the bowl, that is, in the mud-like substance. It can be seen that if a prescription containing coptis and licorice is decoctioned and the resulting soup is placed in a bowl, the muddy paste at the bottom of the bowl will obviously affect the efficacy of the medicine if discarded.

　　The correct way is to add some water to the muddy sediment, stir it, and then drink the turbid liquid. There are many famous prescriptions in traditional Chinese medicine that contain both licorice and coptis, such as Coptis Decoction in "Treatise on Febrile Diseases" (prescriptions for Coptis chinensis, dried ginger, cassia twig, pinellia, Codonopsis pilosula, licorice, jujube), Gegen Huangfen Coptis Decoction (prescriptions for Pueraria lobata, skullcap, coptis, licorice), Shaoyao Decoction in "Baoming Collection" (prescriptions for peony, Scutellaria baicalensis, angelica root, betel nut, coptis, rhubarb, costus, licorice, cinnamon), etc., the decoction of the decoction, and the muddy substance that appears at the bottom of the bowl after being placed, can be mixed with water before taking it, or simply stir the whole bowl of soup before taking it, it is better not to discard it, other decoctions containing these two medicines should be taken according to this method.