Liver Channel
Middle of the Road
中都Zhōng DūAnatomical location
On the medial side of the leg, 7 cun above the medial malleolus, at the posterior border of the tibia.
Main function
Xi-Cleft point, regulates the Liver, stops pain, benefits the Lower Jiao, regulates menstruation.
- Xi-Cleft point
Therapeutic indications
- Menstrual pain
- metrorrhagia
- genital pain
- acute abdominal pain
- leg pain
- Hernia
- Persistent lochia
- Diarrhea
- Leg weakness
- Hypogastric pain
Name and classical tradition
Zhongdu, 中都, is the “capital of the middle.” 中 is the center; 都, the capital, the place of great gathering, the marketplace. The point lies about halfway down the leg, on the inner side, and it is the Xi-Cleft point (郄穴) of the Liver, the place where the channel’s Qi accumulates deeply and the one we turn to in acute conditions. The idea of great concentration that 都 evokes fits that function. It is the same 都 as in SP2, Dadu, and KI19, Yindu.
It is attributed to the Zhenjiu Jiayi Jing (Systematic Classic of Acupuncture and Moxibustion), although the passage has not been located. Its alternative name, 中郄, “cleft of the middle,” is consistent with its status as a Xi-Cleft point.
