Extra point · Head and Neck
Gathering Spring
聚泉Jù QuánAnatomical location
At the center of the dorsal midline of the tongue.
Main function
Benefits the tongue and speech, disperses Heat and Dampness.
Therapeutic indications
- Dysarthria
- loss of taste
- asthma
- chronic cough
Name and classical tradition
Juquan, 聚泉, is the "gathering spring": 聚, to gather, to accumulate; 泉, spring. The point is at the center of the dorsum of the tongue, and the name alludes to the saliva that gathers in the mouth, a fluid the tradition valued highly.
The Zhenjiu Dacheng (Great Compendium of Acupuncture and Moxibustion) devotes one of the most curious entries in its list of points outside the channels to it: "聚泉一穴，在舌上，當舌中，吐出舌，中直有縫陷中是穴". The tongue is stuck out and the point is in the cleft at the center. It was used for asthma and cough that does not heal, and was treated with moxa: a slice of ginger the thickness of a coin on the tongue, with the cone on top. If the cough was from Heat, a little realgar was mixed into the moxa; if from Cold, coltsfoot flower. Afterward, the patient chewed the ginger with tea and swallowed it. The same passage introduces its two neighbors under the tongue, EX-HN12.
