The dictionary collects about nine thousand entries from Basic Theory of TCM, Clinics of TCM, Acupuncture and Moxibustion, Traditional Chinese Drugs, Prescriptions of TCD, History of TCM, Literature of TCM, Massage of TCM, Qigong, Medicated Diet, etc. The compiling work started in July, 1990 and a great effort has been made for five years. In the process the editorial staff has been striving for comprehensiveness and practicality in the entry collection, conciseness and relevancy in the interpretations, and authoritativeness and accuracy in the translations, which can express the connotations of TCM terms properly. The dictionary is one of the main publications of the Eighth Five-Year Plan by the Press and Publications Administration of China.

Attached to the end of the dictionary are two appendices: The Chinese Phonetic Alphabet Index and English Index.

The dictionary is designed for the foreigners who are eager to learn TCM and the Chinese who intend to use it as a tool in their international exchanges of TCM. In addition, the dictionary collects a large number of the terms of TCM with the detailed interpretations, which makes the dictionary a necessary reference book for the persons who intend to learn TCM. In this sense, the dictionary can be considered as one of the largest reference books which are rare in China.

This dictionary has the distinctive features as follows:
1. Extensiveness. The dictionary has collects about 9,000 terms and expressions in TCM, including more than 20 divisions of TCM, such as Study of "The Yellow Emperor's Internal Classic", Study of Treatise on Febrile Diseases, Study of Synopsis of Prescriptions of the Golden Chamber, Health Preservation, Qigong, Clinics of TCM, etc. with accurate English translations. This makes the dictionary outstanding from the like.
2. Accuracy. All the selected entries in the dictionary are chosen by means of the careful research, simplification and refinement in favor of its users. A great effort has been made to present the precise interpretations for each entry and the acceptable interpretations are selected in case of the polysemous ones.
3. Authoritativeness. TCM has a unique theoretical system. Some terms, therefore, are so abstruse and unintelligible that it is very difficult to find out the references for translations. Such terms were translated by the English teachers working in the college of TCM for years, who consulted the authorities on the subjects to grasp the connotations of the terms so that they could translate them into English properly and accurately. The whole English versions have been checked by the nationally well-known scholars on translation.
4. Originality and practicality. The dictionary is laid out originally with Chinese-English entries and interpretations. Indexes of strokes of Chinese character, the Chinese phonetic alphabet system and English alphabet make the dictionary more convenient and practical to it users.