Timing of venesection and persons unfit for it

Safety

• Needs a trained practitioner. This procedure or preparation is of a kind that should only be carried out under qualified supervision.
• Contraindication in the text: Not to be done in those with breathlessness, cough, wasting, fever or travel fatigue, the emaciated, dry or wounded, the very old, children, those with consumption, those purified by emesis or purgation, those depleted by excess sex or fasting, those with convulsions or hemiplegia, pregnant women, or those with depleted semen or gara poison, unless a life-threatening disease curable by venesection is present.
• Caution in the text: Not done in very cold or very hot weather, in a patient heated by fierce sun, not sweated or over-sweated, too unctuous or too dry, after much unpalatable food, or without any food.

Pregnancy, breastfeeding, children, older adults, kidney or liver disease and other medicines all call for professional advice before any traditional remedy is used.