One day when King Hui of Chu from the Warring States Period was dining, he was surprised to find a worm in his pickle dish. Knowing it was a leech, the king was not angry but instead ordered the minister not to tell others so as to avoid embarrassing the chef. To destroy the “evidence”, the king even swallowed the leech. Surprisingly, his long-suffering blood stasis was fully cured.

It was the leech that cured his disease. A kind of mollusk that lives in paddy fields, lakes and marshes, the leech is also a kind of Chinese medicine that can invigorate the blood, remove blood stagnation, and promote menstruation.Therefore, it can be used for the treatment of diseases caused by severe blood stasis.

Research indicates that the leech possesses excellent anticoagulant and thrombolytic properties for the treatment of the cerebral thrombosis, coronary heart disease, and thrombosis-related diseases.

The leech can secrete a very important natural anticoagulant-hirudin, which can make the wound bleed continuously without clotting, and its saliva also contains vasodilator. Because of these characteristics, surgeons once used live leeches to remove blood stasis after finger and ear replantation operations, which greatly improved the success rate of the replantation.