The lungs lie beneath: gentle pressure only, never hard or sharp.
肩中俞 Jianzhongshu
“Central Shoulder Transport” · SI15
Hand Taiyang · 15 of 19
Where. Level with the big bump at the base of the neck, three finger-widths out to either side.
For. Shoulder and back pain, cough.
Press. Two finger pads, slow circles, one minute each side.
Caution. The lungs lie beneath: gentle pressure only, never hard or sharp.
肩中俞，在肩胛內廉，去脊二寸陷者中按 · Press with me
Six slow breaths
About a minute. Press as you breathe out, ease as you breathe in.
鄰 · Neighbouring leaves
Where Jianzhongshu Sits on the Upper Back
The dataset places Jianzhongshu on the upper back, two cun lateral to the lower border of the spinous process of the seventh cervical vertebra. Each term earns a pause. The seventh cervical vertebra supplies the tallest knuckle of the neck-shoulder junction: bow the head forward and the biggest bump at the base of the neck is usually its spinous process, the rear fin of bone every vertebra carries. Its lower border is the underside lip of that bump, and the catalogue entry for Dazhui (GV14) records the famous hollow directly beneath it on the body’s midline. From that lip, two cun sets out sideways — away from the spine, toward the shoulder-blade side. A cun, as ever in this tradition, is not a ruler’s inch but a proportional measure taken from the person being examined; the width of your own thumb at the knuckle is the working approximation, so two cun means about two thumb-widths outward. On a broad back the distance stretches; on a slight one it shrinks. The point lives in your body’s coordinates, not on a tape.
What lies beneath deserves gentle handling. A broad sheet of muscle spreads across this high ground like a shawl drawn over the shoulders, thinning as it climbs toward the neck; beneath it run deeper layers bound down against the frame of the spine. And the geography above matters most: textbook anatomy draws the rounded summit of each lung higher than most people expect, rising above the level of the collarbone toward the root of the neck. High on the upper back, therefore, the margin between skin and significant structure is narrower than intuition suggests — which is exactly why entries across this territory carry unusually stern cautions about depth. Everyday light touch engages only surface tissue, and that is the whole of what self-care needs; the discipline concerning what lies deeper belongs to professional training, and this page leaves it there.
Neighbours help confirm the placement. Inland, the midline runs through the hollow beneath the great bump, where Dazhui holds court. Outward, one further thumb-width, stands the sibling recorded in the catalogue as Jianwaishu (SI14), whose seat is three cun lateral to the lower border of the spinous process of the first thoracic vertebra — one vertebra down the ladder and one thumb-width farther from the spine. The two form an inner-and-outer pair, central and external transports of the same slope, and their names encode the difference. As everywhere on the body the two sides answer each other: whatever the fingers find beside the spine on one side, the mirror search should summon on the other. Searching both together doubles the evidence and halves the doubt.
A Self-Palpation Walkthrough
Sit upright on a firm chair with both feet down and shoulders released, letting the upper back soften. Reach your right hand across to the back of your neck. Bow the head gently forward and walk the fingertips down until they meet the largest bump at its base — the tall knuckle of the seventh cervical vertebra. Straighten halfway and watch the bump settle slightly yet remain the chief of the row. Find its lower border, then walk the fingertips sideways, away from the spine toward the shoulder-blade side, about two thumb-widths. Let the pads drift over the flesh until they settle where the tissue yields most softly: this yielding patch, level with the great bump and clear of the midline, is the recorded seat of Jianzhongshu. Swap hands and repeat the whole search so the other side receives the same careful attention.
A few confirmations settle any doubt. Touch feather-light and compare sides: many people notice a faint, dull awareness at the true point and little sensation a finger-width away. Then try the movement test: draw the shoulder blades gently toward each other and release while a resting fingertip waits in place — the texture shifts beneath the pad while the spot stays put, which tells you the pad rests on muscle rather than naked bone. Finish with a terrain check: the tissue should feel springy and even; a hard cord or a sharp ridge means slide a fraction inward or downward until flesh cushions the touch again. None of these checks requires pressure worth noticing — lightness itself is the instrument.
The common mistakes cluster predictably. Drifting too far outward walks you past the middle of the slope toward Jianwaishu’s recorded ground; settling too low drops you among the upper-back stations a level beneath; climbing too eagerly carries you off the shelf altogether, into the taut muscles of the back of the neck. Another frequent slip is measuring from the wrong landmark — starting from the collarbone’s rear end rather than from the great bump — which scatters everything downstream. When in doubt, return to the base of the neck, find the tallest knuckle once more, and measure the sideways walk a single time, slowly.
Reading the Name: the Central Shoulder Transport
The characters tell the story in miniature. Jian 肩 means the shoulder, plainly and without ornament. Zhong 中 means central or middle — the character pictures a marker set through the middle of a field. Shu 俞 belongs to the transport family of characters, written variously 俞, 腧, and 輸, which mark the stations where channel qi infuses, pools, and passes through — way-stations on the classical map. Joined, Jianzhongshu reads as the central transport of the shoulder: the gathering-and-relay station assigned to the middle of the shoulder slope. It is traditional reasoning offered plainly, and it does locating work: the name alone tells you the point stands midway on that high shoulder territory rather than out along its rim.
The pairing makes the naming system visible. Next door, Jianwaishu borrows the same opening character and swaps the middle one: wai 外 means outer, so the pair reads central-shoulder-transport and outer-shoulder-transport. Their recorded seats honour the words — the central sibling sits two cun from the spine opposite the seventh cervical vertebra, the outer one three cun from the spine a level lower opposite the first thoracic. Like many of the old names — gates, valleys, courtyards, storehouses — these are locating instructions written into language, and reading them as a set teaches the map faster than memorising numbers ever could.
Pinyin renders the name Jiānzhōngshū, and the melody is unusual in its evenness: all three syllables ride flat first tones — jian, zhong, shu — with none of the rises, dips, or falls marking the other tones. Set in channel context the name gains one more layer. Classical teaching counts the small intestine channel among the fire-natured lines of five-phase thought, and it runs nineteen stations long, journeying from the little finger up the back of the arm, cresting the shoulder region, and making for the neck, cheek, and ear; classical practice consulted it for complaints of the neck, shoulder, and ear. Jianzhongshu stands near the high camp of that route, where the crossing of the shoulder begins its turn toward the neck — a relay post at altitude, true to its name.
Traditional Indications, Explained
The record lists four traditional indications: cough, shortness of breath, shoulder and back pain, and blurred vision. Take the breath pair first. Why would an upper-back station stand in discussions of cough and laboured breath? The tradition’s account leans on adjacency and route: this high ground adjoins the chest above, and the small intestine channel crosses it on the long climb from arm toward face, so when old records judged a cough to have settled into the upper terrain — the kind that rides with stiff shoulders and an aching back — practice selected the local station to attend that region. What older records grouped under such headings spans what modern readers would recognise as many distinct breathing patterns; the grouping is the tradition’s own, inherited whole.
The remaining pair divides neatly. Shoulder and back pain uses the plainest logic the tradition owns: the channel crosses this very slope, so ache judged to live along it summoned the local station — a local point for a local complaint asks only the map and the ache. Blurred vision reaches further. The channel’s journey ends on the face, and route logic long held that stations standing anywhere along a road could be called over for trouble appearing anywhere the road travelled; the high back stations thus stood ready whenever complaint gathered toward the face’s territory. Whether one finds that reasoning persuasive or charming, it documents faithfully how the old map thought — and it is the honest bridge between a shoulder point and an eye complaint, better than any invented anatomy would be.
It bears repeating plainly: these are the traditional uses recorded in a licensed dataset and classical literature, offered here for cultural and historical understanding. They are not claims that pressing this point treats disease, and nothing in this guide replaces assessment by a qualified clinician. Where modern research touches self-applied pressure at all, reviews suggest effects are modest and context-dependent, and evidence specific to any single point remains thin. Persistent blurred vision in particular belongs promptly with an eye professional, whatever the tradition’s old confidence. Hold the tradition lightly, and hold the safety rules firmly.
Self-Care Acupressure at Home
With the point located by the walkthrough above, settle into position: seated, feet down, spine tall but unforced, shoulders heavy. Curl index and middle fingers together and rest the pads — not the tips — on the spot. Begin with contact alone for a few unhurried breaths, then add small, slow circles, letting the skin glide over the tissue beneath rather than grinding against the frame. Pressure should register as pleasant dullness or mild warmth, never sharpness. A common home rhythm is one to three minutes per side, once or twice daily, matched where possible to slow exhales so each circle rides the breath out. Swap hands and repeat on the other side, keeping the two sessions symmetrical.
Quality matters more than duration. Light, patient, regularly repeated contact fits the wellness register this page practises; hard jabbing invites the muscles of the upper back to guard, which undoes everything the pause is for. Warm your hands first if they run cold, because chilled muscle braces. Choose a quiet corner over a screen, since the practice doubles as a small ceremony of attention rather than background fidgeting. People who keep a routine usually anchor it to an existing habit — after the morning wash, midway through a desk-bound afternoon — because consistency, not intensity, is what self-care traditions actually reward. Across weeks, notice what changes without demanding outcomes: perhaps less guardedness between the shoulder blades, perhaps easier turning of the head, perhaps only ninety borrowed seconds of attending to your own body.
Boundaries belong inside the practice, not just around it. Reaching across to search the upper back can itself strain a complaining shoulder or neck; if the search provokes pain, shrink the motion, use the comfortable hand, or ask a companion to help confirm the spot while you rest. Never press into a wince, and never escalate force, duration, or depth to hurry a result; escalation is the one move this practice never rewards. On days when the area refuses even gentle contact, grant it the day off. Curiosity that pulls toward forcing is answered the same way every time: return to gentleness, or stop for today.
Cautions and Safe Practice
An honest page states every word the record carries. For this entry the licensed dataset attaches an explicit caution asking trained hands never to work deep here, because excessive depth at this site may injure the lung. The geography explains the severity. High on the upper back, the covering sheet of muscle thins as it climbs toward the neck, and the rounded summit of the lung rises above collarbone level toward the root of the neck — closer beneath this shelf than intuition guesses. Depth here carries stakes out of proportion to the modest distance involved, and neighbouring entries on this slope carry cautions in the same family. Professional training manages the recorded risk with exact technique; home self-care manages it differently and far more simply — by never leaving the surface at all.
The practical rules gather quickly. Use finger pads only — no elbows, knuckles, or tools — and keep the intention strictly superficial. Stop at once, and for the day, on any sharp, electric, or radiating sensation. Skip the point entirely during any feverish illness, over broken or irritated skin, and after recent injury or surgery to the neck or upper back until a clinician clears ordinary activity. Pregnant readers, and anyone living with lung or breathing conditions, should consult a qualified practitioner before adding any new point work to their routine. None of these rules costs the practice anything; gentleness was already the plan.
And the wider rule stands over everything: this page is educational, and acupressure is self-care — comfort and companionship for a body, not diagnosis or therapy. Seek prompt medical attention, not a longer pressing session, for breathlessness at rest or on mild exertion, coughing blood, a cough lasting beyond a few weeks, severe back or neck pain after a fall or accident, numbness or weakness spreading down an arm, or any symptom that frightens you. Persistent symptoms belong with a licensed practitioner — Western medicine or East Asian medicine, whichever suits the complaint. The high-camp imagery suits this point, and the safest gift Jianzhongshu offers most people matches it: a few quiet minutes spent learning the ground where neck becomes back, treated kindly.
Jianzhongshu, the Central Shoulder Transport, sits high on the upper back, two cun out from the base of the neck beside the seventh cervical vertebra. Classical practice reached for it when cough or tight breath arrived alongside a stiff, aching shoulder and back. This guide walks through finding it by touch and pressing it safely.
Cautions from the classical sources
- Keep insertion shallow; too much depth can damage the lung.
Self-care limits
Frequently asked
- How do I find Jianzhongshu without knowing anything about cun?
- Use the bump at the base of the neck as the whole map. Bow the head, find the largest knuckle of the neck-shoulder junction — usually the seventh cervical vertebra — locate its lower border, then walk about two thumb-widths sideways, away from the spine toward the shoulder blade, stopping where the flesh yields most softly. Cun measurements simply encode the same landmark sequence in proportional language; the thumb-width version is its folk translation.
- Is pressing Jianzhongshu myself actually safe?
- Gentle fingertip pressure held on the surface is generally reasonable everyday self-care for healthy adults: it engages skin and superficial muscle, far short of the structures the recorded caution worries about. That caution concerns deep professional technique — a category home acupressure never approaches, and one taken especially seriously this high on the back because the summit of the lung climbs close to this territory. Respect the stop signals regardless: sharp, electric, or radiating sensation, or discomfort that worsens, all mean finish immediately.
- What did classical practice use Jianzhongshu for?
- The traditional record lists cough, shortness of breath, shoulder and back pain, and blurred vision. Breath complaints dominated because this high ground adjoins the chest and the channel crosses it on the way from arm toward face; the eye listing reflects the old habit of drafting stations along a route wherever the road travelled. Those frameworks document how tradition mapped the body — offered for cultural understanding, not as evidence-backed treatment claims.
- Why “central”, and how does it differ from Jianwaishu next door?
- They are named as a pair: jian-zhong-shu is the central shoulder transport, jian-wai-shu the outer one. Their recorded seats match the words — Jianzhongshu sits two cun from the spine opposite the seventh cervical vertebra, Jianwaishu three cun from the spine a level lower opposite the first thoracic. Inner and outer siblings on the same slope, located by their names before any ruler comes out.
- Can acupressure at Jianzhongshu replace seeing a doctor about my cough?
- No. Self-acupressure is a comfort practice, not diagnosis or therapy, and a cough carrying red flags — blood, fever, worsening breathlessness, duration beyond a few weeks — needs prompt professional assessment. Picture two floors of one building: daily gentle self-care lives downstairs, while the consulting room upstairs belongs to licensed clinicians you visit when symptoms persist or escalate. Neither substitutes for the other.
Sources
- 01WHO Standard Acupuncture Point Locations in the Western Pacific Region (2008), World Health Organization — nomenclature conventions.
- 02A Manual of Acupuncture, Peter Deadman, Mazin Al-Khafaji and Kevin Baker — point-name tradition, transport-character family, and channel context.
- 03aijiu-mpvue (MIT License) licensed dataset, entry for SI15 Jianzhongshu — location, point class, action record, and caution note.
Last reviewed
牌記This leaf, for machines
Old books ended with a colophon saying who printed them. Every leaf here carries the same facts as structured data for agents and search, with no layout in the way.
- GET /en/points/si15/leaf.json
- GET /zh-hant/points/si15/leaf.json
- GET /zh-cn/points/si15/leaf.json
- /llms.txt — the index of every leaf
- JSON-LD in the page: MedicalWebPage, MedicalEntity and FAQPage
{
"id": "SI15",
"name": {
"en": "Jianzhongshu",
"gloss": "Central Shoulder Transport",
"zh-Hant": "肩中俞",
"zh-Hans": "肩中俞"
},
"channel": {
"id": "SI",
"order": 15,
"of": 19
},
"location": {
"text": "Level with the big bump at the base of the neck, three finger-widths out to either side."
},
"for": [
"shoulder and back pain",
"cough"
],
"press": {
"text": "Two finger pads, slow circles, one minute each side.",
"seconds": 60,
"sides": "both"
},
"cautions": [
"The lungs lie beneath: gentle pressure only, never hard or sharp."
],
"source": "Zhenjiu Jiayi Jing, book 3",
"url": "https://acupoints.com/en/points/si15",
"lastReviewed": "2026-08-24"
}