Gui Zhi
English Name: Cinnamon Twig
Pharmaceutical name: Ramulus Cinnamoni
Medica Category: Wind-Cold Releasing Herbs
Properties: Gui Zhi enters the Heart, Lung, and Urinary Bladder channels; it is acrid and sweet in nature and warm in temperature
What is Gui Zhi?:
The Chinese Herb Gui zhi is the twig of the Cinnamon tree stripped of its bark, dried, and cut into thin slices.
Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Therapeutic Actions of Gui Zhi:
Gui Zhi regulates and adjusts the harmony between the nutritive and protective layers of qi; it releases externally contracted wind-cold from the outer muscle layer through diaphoresis (when wind-cold causes the pores to constrict (thereby inhibiting sweating)).
Gui Zhi also warms and open the channels and collaterals to treat stagnation caused by wind, cold and dampness. In this regard it can also be added to formulas to help carry healing effects out the extremities (toes and fingertips, for example).
Gui Zhi additionally warms and stimulates the Yang and can be used eliminate cold and stagnation in a variety of contexts (e.g. amenorrhea, Xiong Bi (pain in the chest caused by phlegm stagnation and cold), and edema to name three).