- Acupuncture wise, you can bleed ST 40, BL 40, San zhong/ three weights, and PC 3. You can needle Zheng jin and Lung 7.
All these point regions are implicated for brain disease.
ST 40 and San zhong/ three weights are yangming/ shaoyang points to help treat phlegm fire in the brain and systemic blood stasis. St 40 the luo point also treats dampness of the spleen, and Suwen 74 tells us that spasms and head stiffness belongs to dampness 諸痙項強，皆屬於濕. And dampness is the qi of the spleen 諸濕….皆屬於脾. Sanzhong and yangming help treat dampness in sanjiao, connective tissue/ meninges in the brain.
BL 40 and PC 3 help treat blood heat and infectious disease. BL 40 alternative name is called the blood xi cleft, 血 . Also treats disease in the brain because a branch of foot taiyang enters and nets with the brain 其直者，從巔入絡腦 (Lingshu 10).
PC 3, the water of fire, helps cool disease at the blood level of jueyin. Pericardium is the upper axis of foot jueyin, which enters the brain/ top of the head. Also Pericardium 6 is applicable because Lingshu 10 tells us that vacuity symptoms of the Luo mai causes head rigidity 虛則為頭強.
Zhengjin and Lung 7 are guiding points to taiyang/ back of the neck.
Meningitis is therefore seen as a disease of Taiyang, yangming, Shaoyang, and jueyin. One can say even Taiyin because of the dampness. But its a hot dampness so we treat through yangming and shaoyang. But what led to susceptibility was the weak zhong qi.
Taiyang and Jueyin because they affect the brain are both full of blood.
Here are formulas that would treat meningitis and have been historically used for epidemic encephalitis. Bai hu tang would be the first in the list, if there is dampness then Bai hu jia cang zhu tang, can even think of adding Qiang huo for wind dampness in Taiyang. One has to go high on the shi gao (50 grams-200 grams). High cang zhu might also be needed.
Another important yangming strategy and for infectious disease is to purge yangming, bowels, so Da cheng qi tang. But if its really febrile, Tao he cheng qi tang, since it treats abscess and purulence. It can treat purulence in the brain, since the brain is a called an extraordinary bowel 腦髓…名曰奇恆之府. So one can open the bowels below to treat the bowels above. Da cheng qi tang treats more the qi layer while Tao he cheng qi tang is focused more on the blood than DCQT.
If its very yang excess, one can even purge with Da huang mu dan pi tang (here there is more blood heat than Tao he cheng qi tang), hene why THCQT has gui zhi and DHMDPT has mu dan pi, one is to warm and move the static blood, another cools and moves the static blood. Not to say THCQT does not clear heat, all yangming methods do, the difference is that in THQT there is some yin cold within yangming that is basically now trapping the yang so one needs to warm within the cooling approach.
With that train of thought, also Bai hu jia gui zhi tang, technically a hot malaria formula per the Jingui, it can be used for all viral infectious disease. Gui zhi also helps treat the taiyang aspect of meninigitis.
Another formula used is Ge gen tang, which treats stiffness in the neck. Its been used for brain disease in fact. Also the cold malaria formula chai hu gui zhi gan jiang is the equivalent of the Tung point, San zhong. It has tian hua fen and mu li to flush phlegm heat in shaoyang, and gui zhi and gan jiang to warm and guide to taiyang and taiyin so yang and yin open, and chai hu to guide to the brain. Huang qin to clear the fire in the upper jiao.
Since we are talking of viral diseases, we need to think about shaoyang and jueyin. Shaoyang particularly for lurking disease.
Xiao chai hu tang comes to mind, especially Xiao chai hu tang minus Ban xia plus Tian hua fen and mu li to incorporate Gua lou mu li san.
But since we are opening the bowels, Da chai hu tang is important to think about. Chai hu jia long gu mu li tang also is an important consideration and opens the bowels (all open bowels methods I’ve mentioned are Da huang methods).
A Wenbing formula one should think about is Chai hu da yuan yin, this treat lurking disease in shaoyang, which includes the connective tissue of the brain.
Huang lian jie du tang is another consideration, for fire toxin. San huang xie xin tang also treats all heat in the orifices, usually manifesting as bleeding, like intracranial bleeding, but bleeding is not necessary, since that’s just a sign of hot blood due to yangming.
Of course, this can also be heat in the blood layer, and one can use Xi jiao di huang tang, or the jueyin formula, Sheng ma bie jia tang. Sheng ma treats the most pestilent of fire toxins in the blood, bie jia (the turtle) has correspondance with the brain, the tissue of shaoyin. The brain like the turtle has a shell, the cranium. So biejia can move static blood in the brain while protecting it through its simultaneous nourishing and invigorating properties of the deep yin.
That all comes to mind.
Primordial medicine 