General Description

Cough is a main symptom in pulmonary diseases. Generally, cough with a sound but without sputum is called "ke", while cough with sputum but without sound is called "sou". Since a cough usually with both sound and sputum, they are simply called "ke sou" clinically. Cough is a common symptom of various diseases as well as an independent disease. From the point of etiology, cough can be divided into two types, exogenous and endogenous. The former is caused by the six exogenous pathogenic factors invading the lung while the latter is due to dysfunction of the zang-fu organs leading to disturbance of the lung by endogenous pathogenic factors. Whether the pathogenic factors are exogenous or endogenous, they would impair the purifying and descending function of the lung and induce abnormal rising of lung qi, thus causing cough. In western medicine, cough is the main symptom in diseases such as upper respiratory tract infection, acute and chronic bronchitis, bronchiectasis, pneumonia and pulmonary tuberculosis.