This study focuses on ethnomedical healers in Lijiang, Yunnan Province, China, and adopts the perspective of medical anthropology to examine, through field work, in-depth interview, and case study, institutional shortcomings and individual predicaments ethnomedical healers face in seeking the legal status for medical practice under the modern medicine and the “Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Specialist” systems. The current assessment system and ethnomedical practice are not aligned in terms of theoretical frameworks, diagnostic and treatment methods, and linguistic logic. Particularly, the systematic discrepancy between the knowledge system required by standardized examinations and ethnomedical healers’ experiential knowledge system has resulted in a large number of “skilled but uncertified” ethnomedical healers struggling to gain official recognition. This study aims to explore the possibility of institutional reform and the coexistence of diverse medical systems by probing into the institutional challenges facing ethnomedicine from the perspective of modern medicine.
Mingzhe Li (Mon,) studied this question.