Any Internet lecture presentation, such as this one, is necessarily concise by design. In order to keep the slides and their notepages to the minimum, here the term Chinese herbal medicines (CHM) is loosely broadened to include, where applicable, the field or profession per se, and any related products prepared with Chinese herbs including herbal therapies, herbal remedies, etc. Otherwise, adulteration is indeed associated much more with Chinese patent medicines than with unpatented herbal remedies. And those herbal products used or sold as dietary supplements should not be referred to as medicines.

As the lecture title implies, four (4) main objectives for learning are provided in this presentation.

One learning objective is to familiarize the students with some of the negative aspects of CHM. This is presumably the bad aspect of CHM.

Another objective is for students to learn about the additional beneficial effects of CHM, especially in terms of health prevention and health maintenance. This is the good side of CHM.

Still another learning objective is to provide students with some insight into the controversies surrounding the use of CHM. This is considered to be perhaps the most ugly part of CHM.

In order for students to appreciate these learning objectives more effectively, they will be given first a brief introduction of how Chinese herbs are used worldwide, including the basic definition of CHM.