膺窗 Yingchuang
“Window of the Chest” · ST16
Foot Yangming · 16 of 45
Where. On the chest, in line with the nipple, in the third gap between the ribs.
For. Cough, shortness of breath, aching chest and ribs.
Press. Gentle pressure, about a minute each side.
膺窗，在屋翳下一寸六分按 · Press with me
Six slow breaths
About a minute. Press as you breathe out, ease as you breathe in.
鄰 · Neighbouring leaves
Where Yingchuang Sits on the Chest
The dataset places Yingchuang on the chest, in the third intercostal space, four cun lateral to the anterior midline. Unpacked: the intercostal spaces are the soft grooves between successive ribs, counted downward from the collarbone, and this one is the third groove met on the way down — a single groove above nipple level. The four cun is measured with the cun, the traditional proportional unit taken from the person’s own frame and commonly reckoned as the width of the thumb, so the same figure scales with the body it describes. Four cun from the midline happens to be the very line on which the nipple sits: the registry places Ruzhong (ST17), directly below, at the centre of the nipple in the fourth space. Everything therefore hangs together on one vertical: find the line, then count the grooves.
What lies under the fingertips deserves respect. A layer of chest-wall muscle covers the spot; beneath the muscle run the ribs themselves, separated by the thin tissues of the intercostal spaces; and beyond those, only a short way in, lies the pleural lining with the lung behind it. High on the chest wall — in the territory where lung tissue rides close during inhalation — the margin between skin and delicate structures is shorter than intuition suggests. This is precisely why the licensed record carries an unusually pointed caution for this site, and why any pressure practised here should stay superficial and unhurried. Nothing about self-palpation requires force; the landmarks announce themselves to patient, light touch.
The neighbourhood forms a tidy ladder. At the lower border of the collarbone waits Qihu (ST13), the Door of Qi; one groove down sits Kufang (ST14) in the first intercostal space, then Wuyi (ST15) in the second, and then Yingchuang in the third. One further step brings the finger to the centre of the nipple itself, where Ruzhong (ST17) stands; below the nipple, at the root of the breast in the fifth space, lies Rugen (ST18). Reading the rungs together confirms the address: a fingertip resting one groove too high finds Wuyi, one groove too low finds the nipple line, and neither is the window.
A Self-Palpation Walkthrough
Sit upright on a firm chair with both feet down and shoulders released, so the chest muscles soften. Begin from the simplest landmark: on most adults the centre of the nipple rests in the fourth intercostal groove on the recorded four-cun line. Settle your fingertips there, confirm the groove beneath the nipple, then walk one clear groove upward — that next gap, the third intercostal space four cun from the midline, is where the dataset locates Yingchuang. If you prefer working outward from the centre of the chest, place a finger at the midline and measure four thumb-widths sideways, then search that vertical for the third groove below the collarbone. Repeat the whole search on the other side, which carries its own mirror-image window.
A few quiet checks settle the matter. Touch feather-light and compare sides: many people notice a faint, dull awareness at the true spot and little sensation a finger-width away. Let a slow breath move under your fingertips — the groove widens slightly as the ribs lift, then settles again as they fall. Check the horizontal distance too: the spot should sit well clear of the breastbone, out on the rounded front of the chest, consistent with the recorded four cun. If what you feel instead is the hard edge of a rib, slide half a thumb-width off the edge and search for the groove again, rather than pressing harder.
The classic mistakes come from miscounted grooves and hurry. Counting from above prevents both: the first groove below the collarbone is the first intercostal space, the second belongs to Wuyi, and the third — the one you want — follows immediately after. Overshooting by a single groove lands on the nipple itself, a point the old records treat as belonging to the map rather than to practice; drifting outward toward the armpit loses the four-cun line altogether. When in doubt, return to the collarbone and count downward slowly, one groove at a time, letting each rib announce its edge before moving on.
Reading the Name: Window of the Chest
The characters sketch the idea plainly. Ying 膺 is the literary word for the front of the chest — the region the classics called the ying, home ground of breath and feeling alike, and preserved today in phrases about indignation filling the chest. Chuang 窗 means window: an opening set in a wall to admit light and air while the wall itself stays standing. Read together, Yingchuang renders as the Window of the Chest — an opening placed in the chest wall.
Commentators in the point-name tradition have long read the image geographically rather than physiologically: a window is where inside meets outside, and the chest wall is precisely such a boundary. Setting an opening there says the tradition treated this spot as a place of communication between the depth of the chest and the surface — light through the wall, breath meeting air. The naming habit belongs to a wider family: gates, valleys, courtyards, storehouses and doors run the length of the channels, and further up the same line sits a station literally named Door of Qi. A door above and a window below make the map easier to carry in the head.
Pinyin writes the name Yīngchuāng: ying rides the first tone — the flat, high, sustained level pitch dictionaries describe — and chuang takes the first tone as well. Spoken plainly, the name falls as two even, level beats, a calm and unhurried sound that suits a window. The hanzi pair 膺窗 is compact enough to memorise at a glance, and like the best of these names it doubles as etiquette: a window asks to be looked through, not pushed against. Light passes; hands stay outside.
A Station on the Stomach Channel’s Descent
The stomach channel draws one of the longest lines on the classical maps, and the site’s own registry sums it up in a sentence: it runs down the front of the body from face to second toe. Classical texts elaborate the opening chapters — beginning beside the nose, threading the gum and lip territory of the lower face, climbing along the hairline to the forehead, then descending past the jaw and down the side of the throat to gather in the supraclavicular hollow at Quepen (ST12). From there the pathway steps onto the chest and begins the long descent of the torso, and the chest stretch walks precisely the ladder described above — rib-gap by rib-gap, four cun wide of the midline.
Yingchuang is the sixteenth station on that journey. Behind it lie the face, the throat, the basin above the collarbone and three chest points; ahead wait the nipple line, the root of the breast, the whole abdomen, and the long road down the leg to the second toe. The numbering tells its own story: sixteen stations in, the channel still stands high on the chest, in country where every recorded caution grows stricter as the lung draws near. Reading the descent as a sequence turns scattered coordinates into a journey anyone can retell — and fixes this point firmly as a waypoint between the collarbone above and the abdomen below.
Why does a stomach-channel point appear in old records for coughs and chests rather than digestion? The traditional answer is the channel map itself: within classical practice, any station along a channel could be reached for complaints arising along that channel’s course, and the stomach channel threads precisely the regions — throat, chest, rib-side — where Yingchuang’s recorded indications live. The reasoning traces lines of influence in the old manner rather than treating organs in isolation. As a framework it is internally coherent, it explains why the point sits where the records place it, and it asks to be understood as traditional geography, not modern physiology.
Traditional Indications, Explained
The dataset records five traditional indications: cough; shortness of breath; distending pain of the chest and hypochondrium; intercostal neuralgia; and breast abscess. Framed as history rather than promise, these are the complaints classical practice traditionally reached for Yingchuang over. The list opens with the family of disordered-breath descriptions — plain cough beside shortness of breath, the records’ shorthand for everything from a tickling dry cough to effortful, unquiet breathing. Distending pain of the chest and hypochondrium is a distinct traditional concept: the hypochondrium is the side of the trunk below the armpit, and distension names a subjective swelling, oppression, or stuck quality across chest and rib-side, read as qi failing to move freely there.
The last two entries deserve unhurried explanation. Intercostal neuralgia is the records’ name for pain travelling along the course of the ribs and the spaces between them — a band-like ache tracking a single groove around the trunk. Breast abscess belongs to the historical category the older texts discussed under breast-swelling names, and it recurs across several neighbouring chest points. A modern reader should hear that final entry as vocabulary from another century: any new breast lump, localised redness, feverish breast pain, or persistent chest-wall pain today belongs promptly with a physician, not with a pressure routine.
It bears repeating plainly: these are the traditional uses recorded in a licensed dataset and described across the classical literature, offered for cultural and historical understanding. They are not claims that pressing this point treats disease, and nothing here replaces assessment by a qualified clinician. Where modern research touches self-applied acupressure at all, reviews suggest effects are modest and heavily dependent on context, and evidence specific to any single point remains thin. Hold the tradition lightly, and hold the safety rules firmly.
Self-Care Acupressure at Home
With the point located by the walkthrough above, settle in: seated, spine tall but unforced, shoulders heavy. Curl the index and middle fingers together and rest the pads — never the tips — on the groove. Begin with contact alone for a few breaths, then add small, slow circles, letting the skin glide over the tissue beneath rather than grinding against the ribs. Pressure should register as pleasant dullness or mild warmth, never sharpness. A conservative 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; then swap hands and give the other side its turn.
Quality outranks duration everywhere in self-care, and doubly so on the chest wall. Warm cold hands first, because chilled muscle guards; choose a quiet corner over a screen, since the practice doubles as a breathing pause — inhale through the nose, feel the chest expand under still fingers, press gently on the long exhale. Many people anchor the routine to an existing habit, morning washing or an afternoon stretch, because consistency, not intensity, is what self-care traditions actually ask for. Miss a day and simply resume tomorrow; there is no backlog to repay.
Treat the exercise as a small ceremony of attention rather than a treatment session. Across weeks you may notice the area feels less guarded, that breathing feels smoother while your hand rests there, or simply that you spent ninety seconds attending to your own body — and every one of those outcomes fits the honest scope of self-acupressure. What does not fit is escalation: pressing harder, longer, or deeper to force a result, least of all at a site where the lung waits so close. When curiosity pulls toward force, that is the signal to return to gentleness, or to stop for the day.
Cautions and Safe Practice
This point earns particular respect, and the reason is written in the licensed record. The dataset cautions practitioners against deep work at this site: where professional needling is undertaken at all, it stays shallow and travels across the chest wall rather than straight inward. The caution follows from plain geography — muscle and thin membrane, then the intercostal tissues, then the pleura and the lung, with little spare room between. Work aimed deeply here risks entering the chest, an outcome that is a medical emergency. Professional training manages that risk with exact technique; home self-care manages it differently and far more simply — by never leaving the surface at all.
For fingertip acupressure the practical rules follow from that picture. Keep pressure light and strictly superficial, with the intention staying in skin and superficial muscle — never driving inward between the ribs. Use finger pads, never elbows, knuckles, or tools, and never press while holding the breath or through pain. Skip the point entirely during any acute breathing difficulty, during a feverish illness, and over broken or irritated skin; be cautious after recent chest injury or surgery until a clinician clears ordinary activity. Sharp, electric, or radiating sensation means stopping at once and not trying again that day. Pregnant readers, and anyone living with lung or heart conditions, should consult a qualified practitioner before adding any new point practice.
And the wider rule stands over everything: this page is educational, and acupressure is self-care, not diagnosis or therapy. Seek prompt medical care — not a pressure routine — for breathlessness at rest or on mild exertion, chest pain, coughing blood, a cough lasting beyond a few weeks, any new breast lump or persistent chest-wall change, or any symptom that frightens you. Persistent complaints belong with a licensed practitioner, medical or East Asian medical as suits the situation. The window imagery is lovely, but the safest gift Yingchuang offers most people is a calmer acquaintance with their own chest wall — looked at kindly, pressed hardly at all.
Yingchuang, the Window of the Chest, sits in the third intercostal space on the front of the chest wall — one rib-gap above nipple level, four cun lateral to the midline. Classical practice reached for this window amid cough, unquiet breath, and distending ache across chest and side-ribs. This guide walks through locating it by touch, reading the name, and keeping self-care on the surface.
Cautions from the classical sources
- Keep insertion shallow, angled obliquely or transversely.
Self-care limits
Frequently asked
- How do I find Yingchuang without knowing anything about cun?
- Use the nipple as the key. On the recorded map, the centre of the nipple sits in the fourth intercostal groove, on the same four-cun vertical as this point. Find that groove, then walk one clear groove upward: the third intercostal space is the location the dataset describes. The cun figures simply encode the same landmark sequence in proportional language — four cun from the midline is the nipple’s own line, and the third groove sits one above the nipple.
- Is pressing Yingchuang myself actually safe?
- Gentle fingertip pressure held on the surface is generally reasonable self-care for healthy adults, because it engages skin and superficial muscle far short of the structures behind the ribs. The recorded danger concerns deep professional techniques directed into the chest — a category home acupressure never approaches. Respect the stop signals: sharp pain, radiating sensation, or discomfort that worsens all mean finishing immediately.
- What did classical practice use Yingchuang for?
- The traditional record lists cough, shortness of breath, distending pain of the chest and hypochondrium, intercostal neuralgia, and breast abscess. The chest-and-ribs flavour follows from the channel map, since the stomach channel threads precisely these regions on its way down the body. These are traditional frameworks documented for context — not evidence-backed treatment claims.
- Why does a stomach-channel point sit up on the chest?
- Because the classical stomach channel runs down the front of the body from face to second toe, and the chest is the longest early chapter of that descent. After crossing at the collarbone the pathway steps rib-gap by rib-gap down the chest, and Yingchuang is the sixteenth station. Classical practice reached for any station along a channel for complaints arising along that channel’s course, which is why a stomach point carries such a chest-shaped historic portfolio.
- Can acupressure at Yingchuang replace seeing a doctor about my symptoms?
- No. Self-acupressure is a comfort practice, not a diagnostic tool, and anything carrying red flags — breathlessness, chest pain, coughing blood, a new breast lump, a cough that will not settle — needs professional assessment promptly. Think of the two as different floors of the same building: daily self-care lives downstairs, and clinical medicine keeps the consulting room upstairs. 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 and channel context.
- 03aijiu-mpvue (MIT License) licensed dataset, entry for ST16 Yingchuang — location, actions, and caution record.
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/st16/leaf.json
- GET /zh-hant/points/st16/leaf.json
- GET /zh-cn/points/st16/leaf.json
- /llms.txt — the index of every leaf
- JSON-LD in the page: MedicalWebPage, MedicalEntity and FAQPage
{
"id": "ST16",
"name": {
"en": "Yingchuang",
"gloss": "Window of the Chest",
"zh-Hant": "膺窗",
"zh-Hans": "膺窗"
},
"channel": {
"id": "ST",
"order": 16,
"of": 45
},
"location": {
"text": "On the chest, in line with the nipple, in the third gap between the ribs."
},
"for": [
"cough",
"shortness of breath",
"aching chest and ribs"
],
"press": {
"text": "Gentle pressure, about a minute each side.",
"seconds": 60,
"sides": "both"
},
"cautions": [],
"source": "Zhenjiu Jiayi Jing, book 3",
"url": "https://acupoints.com/en/points/st16",
"lastReviewed": "2026-08-24"
}