Zhèng Hónggāng 鄭宏綱 (zì Jìmù 紀慕, hào Méijiàn 梅澗, 1727–1787), Qīng physician of Xīpǔ 西埔 in Shèxiàn 歙縣 (Xīn’ān 新安, modern Anhui). Hereditary laryngologist (hóukē 喉科) of four-or-more generations; senior figure of the Xīn’ān 新安 medical school. CBDB id 684510 (no dates recorded in the CBDB row; lifedates from the standard local biographical sources and modern TCM-history reference works are unanimous: 1727–1787).
Zhèng is the author of the foundational Qīng laryngology classic Chónglóu yùyuè 重樓玉鑰 (KR3em017), in two juǎn, completed in manuscript during his active practice and posthumously printed in Sūzhōu in 1839 under the editorial supervision of Sūn Xuéshī 孫學詩. His younger brothers Zhèng Chénghàn 鄭承翰 (hào Shūfú 樞扶) and Zhèng Jìjūn 鄭既均 are his clinical co-workers and the editors of the text; the Shūfúshì yuē 樞扶氏曰 commentary throughout juǎn shàng is Chénghàn’s. The Méijiàn yīyǔ 梅澗醫語 coda in juǎn xià is Zhèng’s own statement; it constitutes the earliest secure clinical identification in pre-modern Chinese medical literature of the epidemic later called báihóu 白喉 (diphtheria) as a distinct disease entity arising from latent heat in the Shǎoyīn kidney channel, and supplies the canonical formula Yǎngyīn qīngfèi tāng 養陰清肺湯 together with twelve contraindicated materia medica. The discipline of Qīng-Republic hóukē takes its received vocabulary, three-formula core (Zǐzhèngsǎn, Dìhuángsǎn, Bīngpéngsǎn) and treatment paradigm directly from this text; the immediate supplement is KR3em018 by Fāng Chéngpéi 方成培 (1838), and a critical refinement is KR3em020 by Chén Bǎoshàn 陳葆善 (1898).