"Whether we recognize it or not, most of us Westerners think of what we learned about the human body in high school as "the really real" description of reality, not [just] one possible description. However, if Chinese medicine is to make any sense to Westerners at all, one must be able to entertain the notion that there are potentially other valid descriptions of the human body, its functions, health, and disease. In grappling with this fundamentally important issue, it is useful to think about the concepts of a map and the terrain it describes...

What I am getting at here is that the map is not the terrain. The Western biological map of the human body is only one potentially useful medical map. It is no more true than the traditional Chinese medical map, and the "facts" of one map cannot be reduced to the criteria or standards of another unless they share the same logic right from the beginning. As long as [a given] medical map is capable of solving a person's disease in a cost-effective, time-efficacy manner without wide effects or iatrogenesis (meaning doctor-caused disease), then it is a useful map ... The Chinese medical map of health is just as "real" as the Western biological map as long as, using it, professional practitioners are able to solve their patients' health problems in a safe and effective way."
--Bob Flaws, Chinese Medicine author, scholar and practitioner since the 1970s

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Over the course of at least 5,000 years, Chinese medicine has classified health and illness based on the differentiation of symptoms (what the patient experiences) and signs (what the doctor observes).

In particular, by examining practical observations from generation to generation, and the results of specific clinical practices, Chinese medicine has elaborated the properties of various kinds of pathogenic factors (causes of disease).

When considering this theoretical framework, please bear in mind that the absolute existence of these factors is unimportant; what matters is that they provide a workable context for successfully treating every observable and reported detail encountered in clinic.

Six Natural/Environmental Factors

Cold

Wind

Fire (and heat)

Summer-heat

Dampness

Dryness

Epidemic Factors
Seven Emotions

Anger

Joy (excessive)

Grief and Melancholy

Fear

Terror

Over thinking

Diet, Work and Rest
A. Improper Diet

Abnormal Ingestion

Impure Diet

Overindulgence in particular foods

B. Consumption and Impairment Related to Work and Rest

Physical Overstrain

Mental Overstrain

Sexual Overstrain

Excessive Rest

Physical Trauma and Injuries by Animals and Insects
A. Trauma due to Three Different Factors

Traumatic injuries, gunshot wounds and incisions

Burns and Scalds

Cold Injury

B. Common Injuries by Animals and Insects

Bites by wild animals and stings by scorpions or wasps

Snakebites

Rabies

Mosquitoes, ticks, etc.