Construction and interpretation of the theoretical system of binding syndrome in traditional Chinese medicine

Binding syndrome is a crucial pathogenesis category in traditional Chinese medicine for understanding the occurrence, development, and outcome of complex diseases. Based on discussions in Huangdi Neijing, Shanghan Zabing Lun, and later medical practitioners on chest binding, zhengjia, abdominal mass, goiter and tumors, phlegm nodules, phlegm-stasis binding, and chronic disease invading the collaterals, this study adopts literature induction, conceptual analysis, and theoretical integration to trace the developmental trajectory of "binding" from its lexical meaning to pathogenesis, disease patterns, and therapeutic methods. It clarifies the theoretical connotation and clinical boundaries of binding syndrome as a dynamic and complex pathogenesis model, and reconstructs its occurrence basis, evolutionary links, and principles of syndrome differentiation and treatment. Binding syndrome is summarized as a dynamic pathological process in which pathogenic factors aggregate from a dispersed state and become fixed from a mobile state, thereby obstructing the movement of qi, blood, and body fluids, and gradually forming an interwoven state of qi binding, phlegm binding, stasis binding, and deficiency binding. In terms of zang-fu pathogenesis, liver failing to convey and disperse marks the beginning of qi binding, impaired spleen transportation and transformation provides the source of phlegm binding, unsmooth blood circulation serves as the pivot of stasis binding, and kidney essence deficiency with insufficiency of healthy qi constitutes the root of deficiency binding. Morphologically, binding syndrome can be classified into invisible binding and visible binding, with disease locations involving the zang-fu organs, meridians and collaterals, body, and orifices. The theory of binding syndrome helps to integrate functional disorder, the generation of pathological products, the formation of visible lesions, and prolonged disease with difficult recovery owing to healthy qi deficiency. It provides a theoretical basis for staged identification, judgment of disease nature, and therapeutic strategies aimed at dispersing binding and removing stagnation in complex disorders.