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Yue Mei-zhong, originally named Yue Zhong-xiu, with the courtesy name Chu Yun, was born into a poor peasant family in Xiaoyuegezhuang, Luannan County, Hebei Province. From the age of 8, he attended a private school for eight years, relying on his parents' borrowing from here and there. He studied diligently and could recite the Five Classics and Four Books. Subsequently, he was admitted to the Luan County Normal School with a half-scholarship and became a primary school teacher at the age of 17. Besides teaching, he studied ancient literature and poetry with the local scholar Shi Xiaoshan, gaining a solid foundation in literature and history. In 1925, while preparing for the entrance examination of the Tsinghua Academy of Chinese Learning founded by Liang Qichao and Wang Guowei, Yue Mei-zhong overworked himself and fell ill with pulmonary tuberculosis and hemoptysis, leading to the loss of his teaching position. During his convalescence, Yue Mei-zhong conceived the idea of studying Chinese medicine. He purchased books such as "Yixue Zhongzhong Canxilu," "Tangtou Gejue," "Medicinal Property Fu," and "Cold-Damage Disease Treatise," and tried taking medications while reading. After more than a year of rest and taking Chinese medicinals, his pulmonary tuberculosis was unexpectedly cured. Having personally experienced the efficacy of Chinese medicine in treating diseases, he resolved to delve into medical studies to save himself and others.

At the beginning of his medical studies, Yue Mei-zhong started with "Yixue Zhongzhong Canxilu" and read many famous works by physicians from the Song and Yuan dynasties onwards. To understand medicinal properties, he often bought and took medicines himself, once suffering from severe diarrhea due to excessive intake of gypsum. A lady suffering from menorrhagia sought Yue Mei-zhong's treatment. After several doses of medicine, she recovered. During the Spring Festival, the patient's entire family came by carriage to express their gratitude, causing a sensation. A carpenter from a neighboring village, Xu Fuxuan, suddenly suffered from mental illness, with dysphoria and violent behavior, leaving many doctors helpless. Yue Mei-zhong carefully examined his pulse and symptoms, diagnosed it as "yang mania with blood stasis," and treated him with Stomach-Regulating Purgative Decoction, curing him. The news spread, and patients flocked to him. With the help of friends, Yue Mei-zhong opened a small pharmacy in Sigezhuang, Luan County, named "Chu Yun Medical Society," thus beginning his medical practice.

In 1935, through a friend's introduction, Yue Mei-zhong went to Heze County Hospital in Shandong Province to serve as the head of the Chinese medicine department. While diagnosing and treating patients, he studied "Cold-Damage Disease Treatise Modern Interpretation" and "Jingui Yaolue Modern Interpretation" by Mr. Lu Yuanlei from Shanghai, and later joined the correspondence department founded by Mr. Lu. Despite his busy schedule, he diligently completed his coursework and sent it to Shanghai for advice. One of his essays on his learning experience, titled "Shu Xue," was praised by Mr. Lu, who added an encouraging note: "Chinese medicine has found a talent, worthy of pride," and recommended it for publication in "New Life of Chinese Medicine." In the spring of 1938, Yue Mei-zhong went to Boshan for consultations, coinciding with the Japanese army's attack on the city. After the city fell, he fled to Jinan and, with the help of the renowned Shandong physician Hao Yunbin, managed to return to his hometown. Later, he went to Tangshan to practice medicine. From 1938 to 1948, Yue Mei-zhong spent his days treating patients and relieving their suffering, and his nights studying classical formulas and various medical texts by lamplight. Despite the hardships, his studies made significant progress. In his spare time, he wrote over 30 volumes, including "Experimental Materia Medica Notes," "Chu Yun Medical Talks," and "Chu Yun Miscellany." In 1946, Yue Mei-zhong went to Beiping to take an examination and obtained a license as a physician/doctor of Chinese medicine.After the establishment of the People's Republic of China, Yue Mei-zhong served as the director of the Tangshan City Chinese Medicine Association and as a consultant to the Tangshan City Health Bureau. In 1953, together with Li Zhen-san, the son of Li Ding-ming, he drafted a ten-thousand-word report on the development of Chinese medicine, which was submitted to the State Council. In the spring of 1954, Yue Mei-zhong was transferred to the Chinese Medicine Experimental Institute of the North China Administrative Committee as the medical director; in August, he was appointed as the deputy director of the outpatient department of the Chinese Medicine Research Institute Preparatory Office of the Ministry of Health. He joined the Chinese Communist Party in 1956. Shortly thereafter, he went to Liaoning Province to investigate leprosy, conducting in-depth research on the disease. Subsequently, he was appointed as the deputy editor-in-chief of the "Sexually Transmitted Disease Leprosy Magazine." In 1957, he visited Japan as the sole representative of Chinese medicine in the first Chinese medical delegation, engaging in academic exchanges. In 1959, he was sent to the Soviet Union on a medical mission. In 1962, he accompanied the Chinese medical team to Indonesia to treat then-President Sukarno for left kidney stones and kidney failure, creatively applying Chinese medicine treatments for "urolithic stranguria" to this condition, achieving significant results. Sukarno hailed it as "a miracle of socialist China's Chinese medicine."

After 1970, in addition to his regular medical practice, Yue Mei-zhong took on the responsibility of providing medical care for central leaders including Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, and Ye Jianying within the country. He was dedicated to researching the prevention and treatment of geriatric diseases, treated Ho Chi Minh and Choe Yong-gon, and received positive feedback from abroad. In 1972, he submitted a proposal to the Ministry of Health and central leaders advocating for the establishment of a national Chinese medicine research class, which was approved. The first batch of students was enrolled in 1976, and by 1978, it was transformed into a Chinese medicine postgraduate class. In July 1978, during the re-examination for Chinese medicine postgraduate admissions, he suffered a stroke (acute occlusive cerebrovascular disease) due to overwork, resulting in left-sided hemiplegia. He was bedridden until his death in 1982.

In his later years, Yue Mei-zhong was elected as a member of the Standing Committee of the Fifth National People's Congress, served as the deputy head of the Medical and Health Group of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, a member of the Weizhong (BL40) Medical Specialty Group of the National Science Commission, a member of the Science Committee of the Ministry of Health, vice president of the Chinese Medical Association, vice president of the All-China Chinese Medicine Association, advisor to the China Association for the Integration of Chinese and Western Medicine, advisor to the Chinese Medicine Ancient Books Publishing House, honorary member of the Academic Committee of the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, head of the postgraduate class at the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences, and director and professor of the Internal Medicine Department at Xiyuan Hospital of the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences. He was beloved by Chinese medicine and integration of Chinese and Western medicine practitioners nationwide and held a high reputation in the Chinese medicine academic community.

Diligent in study and earnest in seeking truth

Yue Mei-zhong began studying medicine due to a lung disease with hemoptysis that was ineffective in treatment, prompting him to purchase and read medical books in an attempt to cure himself. He embarked on the path of studying medicine without family tradition or mentorship, relying mainly on self-study through hard work, experiencing many hardships. His medical learning process can be summarized into three stages: Initially, he started with Zhang Xi-chun's "Yixue Zhongzhong Canxilu," often using contemporary prescriptions to treat patients. After some clinical experience, he felt limited and turned to study the warm diseases theories of Wu Ju-tong and Wang Meng-ying from the Qing Dynasty, applying them clinically with mixed results, also finding their prescriptions trivial and weak. Later, he studied the "Treatise on Cold Damage Diseases" and "Jingui Yaolue," noting their approach of observing symptoms without discussing pathology, prescribing formulas without mentioning medicinal properties, establishing theories based on objectivity, and using drugs to eliminate phlegm. Their simple academic approach closely approached the essence of science, truly a sharp tool for curing diseases. He then delved into the "Qianjin Yaofang" and "Waitai Miyao" from the Tang Dynasty, finding their simple learning and practical prescriptions directly connected to Zhang Zhongjing, and when used appropriately, they were as effective as a drum responding to a drumstick. From 1934 to 1949, he exclusively used ancient prescriptions to treat diseases, often curing serious conditions, further solidifying his belief in the profundity of Chinese medicine, which he believed was not found after the Song and Yuan dynasties. Therefore, over the years, he earnestly studied pre-Tang Dynasty medicine, achieving considerable success. This was the first stage.

Later, Yue Mei-zhong gradually realized through continuous study and experience that exclusively adhering to ancient prescriptions also had its shortcomings. On one hand, the diseases encountered in clinical practice were numerous, while the methods he held were few, sometimes struggling to cope, unable to respond flexibly and appropriately; on the other hand, classical formulas had a focus on warming and tonifying, and if the diagnosis was unclear, the disease would change with the medication. Fairly speaking, the gains and losses of warming, heating, cooling, and chilling are equal if one is biased. Treating diseases with preconceptions makes it difficult to achieve complete efficacy. From the late 1940s to the early 1950s, through reading, clinical practice, and discussions with peers, his understanding advanced, realizing that specializing in "cold damage diseases" could lead to coarseness, while specializing in "warm diseases" could lead to superficiality; coarseness often leads to failure, and superficiality often leads to perfunctoriness. One must study ancient prescriptions to be meticulous and study contemporary prescriptions to be practical. Being meticulous allows for managing complex and numerous disorders, and being practical enables lifting the burden of severe and chronic diseases. At that time, Yue Mei-zhong summarized this period of study and clinical experience, believing that for serious and major diseases, Zhang Zhongjing's classical formulas should be used; for spleen and stomach diseases, Li Dongyuan's prescriptions were better; for warm and mild diseases, the detailed prescriptions of the Ye school were commendable. In summary, only by selecting prescriptions and medications according to the person, the condition, the time, and the place, can one be unbiased and accurately target the disease mechanism. This was the understanding of the second stage.