{ "abstract": "Background\n\nTemple prescription slips are Chinese religious-medical texts that combine divination practice, materia medica knowledge and household self-care. Malaysian Chinese temple slips remain poorly documented, particularly with respect to sampling, transcription, source identification, safety issues and reproducible informatics analysis.Methods\n\nA complete on-site convenience census of 106 publicly accessible prescription slips from the Goddess of Mercy Temple, Penang, was photographed. One non-prescription slip and two illegible slips were excluded, leaving 103 prescriptions for practitioner-based analysis. Herb names were transcribed, standardised, interpreted with an experienced TCM practitioner and cross-checked against materia medica, pharmacopoeial and plant-name resources. Prescriptions were categorised into Formulary of Chinese Medicine categories, coded for safety/interpretation issues and mapped using BATMAN-TCM disease-domain enrichment (target score > = 0.84; adjusted p < 0.05). The workflow was designed for documentary standardisation and hypothesis generation rather than validation of clinical efficacy.Results\n\nThe most frequent categories were Tonifying (16/103, 15.53%), Heat-clearing (15/103, 14.56%), Phlegm-resolving (10/103, 9.71%) and Dampness-eliminating (9/103, 8.74%). Several entries required correction or remained low-confidence because of handwritten, vernacular or multi-source names. Practitioner-coded cautions were dominated by cold-digestion, yin-deficiency/heat-dry, dampness/phlegm/stagnation, pregnancy/reproductive and toxic/mineral safety issues. BATMAN-TCM generated broad enrichment outputs for 101 prescriptions, mainly cardiovascular, pain/inflammatory and neurodegenerative/neurological domains. These outputs were treated as exploratory database signals, not clinical claims.Conclusion\n\nThis single-site corpus shows recognisable TCM formula logic, diaspora adaptation and safety-relevant uncertainties. The findings are hypothesis-generating only; they do not validate temple medicine generally or demonstrate efficacy for specific diseases. The protocol provides a reproducible basis for future multi-site, multi-practitioner, pharmacognostic and experimental research.", "abstract_shown": true, "affiliations": [ "The Second Affiliated Hospital of Henan Medical University (Henan Mental Hospital), Xinxiang City, 453002, Henan Province, China.", "School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Minden, 11800, Penang, Malaysia.", "Faculty of Business and Communications, INTI International University, Persiaran Perdana BBN, 71800, Nilai, Malaysia.", "The Second Affiliated Hospital of Henan Medical University (Henan Mental Hospital), Xinxiang City, 453002, Henan Province, China. drqiyueqiu@163.com.", "School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Minden, 11800, Penang, Malaysia. drqiyueqiu@163.com.", "The Second Affiliated Hospital of Henan Medical University (Henan Mental Hospital), Xinxiang City, 453002, Henan Province, China. zhangruilingxxmu@126.com.", "The Second Affiliated Hospital of Henan Medical University (Henan Mental Hospital), Xinxiang City, 453002, Henan Province, China. yammunfei@yahoo.com.", "School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Minden, 11800, Penang, Malaysia. yammunfei@yahoo.com.", "Faculty of Business and Communications, INTI International University, Persiaran Perdana BBN, 71800, Nilai, Malaysia. yammunfei@yahoo.com." ], "article_type": "research article", "arxiv": null, "author_total": 8, "authors": [ { "affs": [ 0, 1 ], "name": "Jia Yi Chong" }, { "affs": [ 0, 1, 2 ], "name": "Pin Jun Ooi" }, { "affs": [ 1 ], "name": "Xuan Jie Ang" }, { "affs": [ 1, 2 ], "name": "Jing Hui Wong" }, { "affs": [ 1 ], "name": "Alvin Chin Ping Ang" }, { "affs": [ 3, 4 ], "name": "Qiyue Qiu" }, { "affs": [ 5 ], "name": "Ruiling Zhang" }, { "affs": [ 6, 7, 8 ], "name": "Mun Fei Yam" } ], "bibtex": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/aes8200vxttp9.bib", "cited_by": 0, "doi": "10.1186/s13002-026-00914-4", "fulltext_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13721512", "id": "aes8200vxttp9", "issns": [ "1746-4269" ], "landing_url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42958395", "language": "eng", "licence": "CC-BY-NC-ND", "licence_label": "CC BY-NC-ND", "licence_source": "article", "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/", "metadata_licence": null, "native_subjects": [ [ "heading", "Research" ], [ "lcc", "QK1-989" ], [ "lcc", "RZ201-999" ], [ "openalex", "2707|Traditional Chinese Medicine Studies" ] ], "openalex": "W7171955447", "pdf_url": "https://europepmc.org/articles/PMC13721512?pdf=render", "pmcid": "PMC13721512", "pmid": "42958395", "published": "2026-07-01", "publisher": "BMC", "ris": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/aes8200vxttp9.ris", "sources": [ { "first_seen": "2026-10-31T12:21:29Z", "native_id": "MED:42958395", "source": "europepmc", "url": "https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42958395" }, { "first_seen": "2026-11-01T14:21:23Z", "native_id": "068de12e0ad84daab5cf6f39f60ed738", "source": "doaj", "url": "https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-026-00914-4" }, { "first_seen": "2026-11-03T12:22:11Z", "native_id": "PMC13721512", "source": "pmc", "url": "https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-026-00914-4" } ], "subjects": [ { "field": "biology", "origin": "lcc:QK1-989", "subfield": "plant-biology" } ], "title": "Temple prescription slips as living ethnomedicine: practitioner knowledge and exploratory bioinformatics mapping of Malaysian Chinese folk therapeutics.", "title_text": "Temple prescription slips as living ethnomedicine: practitioner knowledge and exploratory bioinformatics mapping of Malaysian Chinese folk therapeutics.", "type": "peer-reviewed", "updated_at": "2026-11-03T14:20:50Z", "url": "https://research.draconitic.com/paper/aes8200vxttp9", "venue": "Journal of ethnobiology and ethnomedicine", "versions": [] }