Took shape more than 2,000 years ago, traditional Tibetan medicine employs a complex approach to diagnose illness by incorporating techniques such as pulse analysis. To preseve this ancient form of medical treatment and make it more accessible to the public, the central and local governments have been making unswerving efforts to cultivate young Chinese Tibetan doctors.


Dunzhu, the director of a local Tibetan medicine research center in Lhasa, says that more people are now becoming interested in this ancient medicine as it's winning increasing acknowledgment for its effectiveness.



"We need people to pass on the old medical techniques. There used to be only 300 students here, but now more than 1,400 people are learning Tibetan medicine."



Official statistics record that there were only two medical facilities in Tibet 50 years ago, but now the department of Tibetan medicine serves all the county-level clinics and hospitals.



Nima is a professor with the institute of traditional Tibetan medicine in Lhasa.



"Higher education in Tibetan medicine, the sanitary conditions and the production of medicine has witnessed a dramatic evolution; even people from abroad want to come here to study this ancient medicine."



More than 2,000 physicians are currently serving in 16 Tibetan medical facilities and the Chinese government has allocated more than 200 million Yuan or nearly 30 million US dollars on the construction of Tibetan medicine factories in the past three decades.