Objective To explore the medication rules of contemporary famous veteran traditional Chinese medicine practitioners in the treatment of ischemic stroke through analysis those medical records. Methods The medical records in CNKI, VIP, Wangfang and related books were used entered into the database. The nature, flavour and the entering meridians, frequency of usage of the herbs and drug combination were were analyzed by association rules and complex system entropy clustering. Results A total of 148 medical records and corresponding prescriptions, 223 kinds of traditional Chinese medicine were included in the study. According to the analysis, 27 flavors of drugs are used frequently ≥20 times, most of the herbs were sweet and warm, which belonged to the liver, heart and spleen meridians; 20 classic combination modes, the high-frequency drug association degree is roughly 14 groups, and 12 new prescriptions have evolved. Among them, the drugs for promoting blood circulation, tonifying Qi and dredging collaterals are the main drugs. Conclusion Tonifying Qi, activating blood circulation and dredging collaterals is the main treatment of ischemic stroke.