Traditional East Asian Medicines Research Network (TEAMsRN): Making Medical Humanities Relevant to the Globalisation of East Asian Medicine

在20世纪初，中国、日本、韩国和其他东亚国家的传统医疗实践在国内外都被视为过去时代的残余，很快就会被不可阻挡的理性和现代化进程所消灭。一个世纪后，同样的传统不仅幸存下来，而且越来越多地融入世界各地的主流卫生保健系统，而医学研究人员则在寻找古老的做法，希望找到治疗现代疾病的新方法。拟议中的东亚传统药物研究网络（TEAMsRN）旨在为我们将东亚药物纳入当代卫生保健的管理过程做出独特贡献。来自不同文化/时代的东亚医学融入当代医疗保健需要复杂的翻译和适应。这些翻译创造了将这些传统与现代医疗保健需求和实践背景相匹配的契合。然而，在人文社会科学之外，这一翻译过程很少得到承认或反思，导致许多问题和争议问题。例如，东亚医学从业者出售的治疗方法声称有几千年的历史，仔细检查就会发现，这是最近西方医学知识在东亚医学领域的翻译。与此同时，临床研究人员试图评估特定治疗或技术的有效性，而不了解这些治疗在传统实践背景下如何获得有效性。因此，这样的研究没有评估任何超出研究人员对东亚药物的想象的东西。TEAMsRN的建立是为了克服这些问题。它的独特性和对东亚传统医学现代化的特殊贡献源于其作为一个平台的目的，通过该平台，临床医生、临床研究人员、政治监管机构和将东亚医学整合到现代卫生保健系统中的其他利益相关者可以直接利用人文和社会科学方面的知识。为此目的，TEAMsRN是作为一个论坛组成的，汇集了一个由在东亚或补充药物领域工作的主要研究人员组成的国际小组，这些研究人员来自通常互不交流的各种学科，如临床医生和临床研究人员、人类学家和医学历史学家、卫生经济学家和科学研究专家。在本次论坛的背景下，与会的学者和研究人员将有机会进行面对面的交流、讨论和辩论。这将使临床医生、研究人员和监管机构面临一些问题，这些问题通常不会在有关安全性、有效性和医学领域不同传统整合的辩论中出现：东亚药物隐含的价值、目标、伦理和疗效模式是什么？随着时间的推移，这些变化在多大程度上是由什么力量驱动的？事实上，这些药物的传统是什么？他们融入现代卫生保健系统的过程背后的意识形态和政治是什么？另一方面，我们也希望为历史学家和社会科学家提出与东亚医学融入当代医疗保健直接相关的新问题：东亚医学声称的有效性和安全性是什么？谁在什么情况下，出于什么目的提出这些主张？是否存在相互竞争的主张？它们从何而来？如何解决两者之间的紧张关系？在这些问题的交叉点上，我们将产生一个反思、对话和辩论的过程，通过这个过程，TEAMsRN将为东亚医学传统的未来发展和研究制定议程。

In the early years of the 20th century, the traditional medical practices of China, Japan, Korea and other East Asian countries were dismissed both at home and abroad as remnants of a past age that would soon be wiped out by the unstoppable march of rationality and modernisation. A century later, the very same traditions have not only survived but are increasingly being integrated into mainstream health care systems throughout the world, while medical researchers scour its ancient practices in the hope of discovering new cures for modern ailments. The proposed Traditional East Asian Medicines Research Network (TEAMsRN) is intended to make a unique contribution to our management of the processes whereby East Asian medicines are integrated into contemporary health care. Coming to us from different cultures/times the integration of East Asian medicines into contemporary healthcare depends on complex translations and adaptations. These translations create the fit that matches these traditions to modern health care needs and contexts of practice. However, outside of the humanities and social sciences, this process of translation is rarely acknowledged or reflected upon leading to numerous problems and contentious issues. For instance, East Asian medicine practitioners sell treatments claimed to be thousands of years old, which on closer inspection turn out to be recent translations of western medical knowledge into the East Asian medicine domain. Clinical researchers meanwhile seek to evaluate the effectiveness of specific treatments or techniques without understanding how these treatments acquired their effectiveness in traditional contexts of practice. As a result, such research does not evaluate anything beyond the researchers' imagination of what East Asian medicines are.TEAMsRN is established with the specific objective to overcome these problems. Its uniqueness and specific contribution to the modernisation of traditional East Asian medicines derives from its purpose as a platform through which knowledge available in the humanities and social sciences is made directly relevant to clinicians, clinical researchers, political regulators and other stakeholders in the integration of East Asian medicine into modern healthcare systems. For this purpose, TEAMsRN is constituted as a forum that brings together an international group of leading researchers working in the fields of East Asian or complementary medicines from a variety of disciplines that do not generally speak to each other, such as clinicians and clinical researchers, anthropologists and medical historians, health economists and science studies experts.In the context of this forum, participating scholars and researchers will have the opportunity for face-to-face interaction, discussion and debate. This will face clinicians, researchers and regulators with questions that do not normally surface in debates about safety, effectiveness, and the integration of different traditions in the medical domain: What are the values, goals, ethics, and models of efficacy implicit to East Asian medicines? To what extent have these changed over time, driven by what forces? What, in fact, is traditional about these medicines? What are the ideologies and politics behind the process of their integration into modern health care systems? From the other, we also hope to raise new questions for historians and social scientists that are directly relevant to the integration of East Asian medicines into contemporary health care: What claims to effectiveness and safety are made by East Asian medicines? Who makes these claims, in what contexts, for what purposes? Are there competing claims? Where do they arise from? How is the tension between these to be resolved?At the intersection of these questions we will generate a process of reflection, dialogue and debate through which TEAMsRN will be setting an agenda for the future development and study of East Asian medical traditions.