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Hue Festival brings back royal healthcare services (16-02-2016 16:38:00)

Vietnam royal healthcare services are being recreated for the first time during the biennial Hue Festival at the country’s former citadel Hue.

Renowned practitioners from Thua Thien-Hue Province Eastern Medicine Association would play the royal family’s doctors to examine, check pulses and prescribe medicine for interested visitors following steps taken for former emperors and royal members. Hue was the capital of Vietnam’s last feudal dynasty Nguyen from 1802 to 1945.

The festival, which lasts from April 12 to 20, also introduces reports by the royal hospital in 1830 during King Minh Mang’s reign and 1849 under King Tu Duc, and displays several products from Hue traditional medicine practice.

The imitative royal hospital was staged almost close to the original by the medicine association and Hue Citadel Preservation Center.

Hue, a UNESCO cultural heritage town, has plans to make a large-scale restoration of the royal hospital by 2015 and promote its traditional medicine legacy to make its healthcare service a tourism attraction.

The first medicine school in Hue was established in 1850 by King Tu Duc. King Minh Mang in 1825 built a temple for worshiping devoted traditional medicine doctors in the country’s history like Tue Tinh in the 14th century and Hai Thuong Lan Ong Le Huu Trac (1720-1791). Renowned doctors emerging from the dynasty were Le Trac Nhu, Nguyen Quang Luong, Nguyen Huan, and revolutionary poet Nguyen Dinh Chieu.

Reference from website www.thanhniennews.com