Homeopathic Medicine

What is homeopathy?

Even though homeopathy is the fastest growing and the second most used system of healing in the world, it is probably the least understood and most misunderstood healing modality. It is often confused with herbal medicine, naturopathic medicine or just a synonym to all natural medicines. Homeopathy is not an old or traditional system of medicine; it is only about 200 years old. It was originated in Germany by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann who was a Medical Doctor, a Biochemist and a prolific writer and translator. Homeopathy has been developed to what it is today by thousands of MDs and non MDs from around the globe.

Homeopathy is based on sound, scientific and logical principles and laws. The highest goal of the homeopathic physician is to produce a rapid yet gentle and permanent cure of the whole body, not just a temporary relief or treatment of a few symptoms, while simultaneously making sure not to cause any harm to the system. From the homeopathic point of view, the “right” medicine cannot be good for one part of the body yet harmful to another.

Rather than adopting a mechanistic and reductionist view of the human being, in which a person is considered as being made of different parts, each part needing to be treated separately by a different substance and a different specialist (three or more different medications for someone suffering simultaneously from asthma, knee pain and depression for instance), the homeopathic physician knows that the wholeness of a human being has started from ONE original cell which has grown and evolved into all these highly communicative interconnected intelligent organs. Parts and pieces of a machine are built separately and then put together so if one part malfunctions, it can be replaced or repaired. Even though this mechanistic analogy can be applied to a human being and produce some beneficial results, these benefits are often short lived and lead to either side effects or suppression of the disease which will cause it to manifest in another part of the body. Perhaps it would be more beneficial to compare a human being to another living organism like a tree which also originates from a single seed but as it grows and evolves it produces a tree with a multitude of branches. In this view, all the symptoms of a patient, be it physical or emotional, are viewed as various branches of the same tree, all connected intimately to a common trunk. Rather than treating each branch with a different substance an experienced homeopath will try to find the link between all the symptoms of a patient and find a remedy for the trunk, the core original imbalance, which is the “real cause” of all the disorders of the patient.

In homeopathy the symptoms of the patient are seen as a highly intelligent and logical language that the body is using to communicate how it is fighting the disease. The symptoms show the observing and experienced eye what needs to be cured. All physical and emotional symptoms are seen as the first expression of the body’s attempt to heal itself and therefore these symptoms need to be studied in depth and should never be suppressed.

The goal of a homeopath is to analyze first what is the patient’s defence mechanism (his healing vital force) “already” doing to get rid of either the innate weaknesses (predispositions with which we are born) or the disease causing factors (pathogens, be it bacterial, emotional, environmental, genetic,…) and then to administer a substance that is able to act exactly in the same direction of the patient’s vital force in order to assist the immune system to create an environment in which the body can do what is already doing in a more efficient way.

Homeopaths think: “Assist and encourage” rather than “fight and oppose”. The word “Homeo” means “similar” and it refers to this concept of finding something in nature that is able to “mimic” and produce symptoms that are the most “similar” to the “totality” of all the past and present physical and emotional symptoms of the individual. Therefore we say homeopathy is based on the “law of similars” as opposed to allopathic (conventional) medicine, which is using the “law of opposites” to resist and suppress symptoms.

The homeopathic motto is: “first do no harm”. As such, the Homeopathic physician endeavours to administer their remedies in the smallest amount possible to get rid of all the “side-effects” which are inherent to all substances, whether from natural sources or manmade chemicals. This brought homeopaths to dilute (more and more) these substances. Clinical experience lead to the discovery that diluting a substance not only removed the undesirable side effects, but it also refined the healing effect of the substance. Some theorize that the extreme dilutions allows the substance to penetrate much deeper into the cells and its nucleus where the building block of life, DNA, is stored and cause a much deeper and longer lasting healing. If you are interested in knowing more about the science behind the homeopathic dilutions please refer to following links:

1) moneylife.in
2) homeopathyresource.wordpress.com/2011/09/25
3) homeopathyresource.wordpress.com/2011/12/28
4) homeopathyresource.wordpress.com/2011/12/25
5) homeopathyresource.wordpress.com/2011/11/25

Swiss Government Study: Homeopathy is Most Cost Effective

Posted on December 25, 2011 by homeopathyresource
The Swiss government has determined that homeopathy is the most cost effective method of the medical treatment of ‘ambulatory’ patients.

“From 1999 to 2005, 5 methods of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) applied by physicians were provisionally included into mandatory Swiss basic health insurance. Within this process, an evaluation of cost-effectiveness is required.”

Homeopathy was one of the five methods and it turns out that it is the most cost effective, more than conventional medicine or any other complimentary medicine. And patients reported better quality of the patient-physician relationship and fewer adverse side effects with all complimentary medical approaches.

The positive general conclusion of the study was: “This study uses a health system perspective and demonstrates at least equal or better cost-effectiveness of complimentary and alternative medicine in the setting of Swiss ambulatory care. CAM can therefore be seen as a valid complement to conventional medicine within Swiss health care.”

The study “Comparison of swiss basic health insurance costs of complementary and conventional medicine”
was published in PubMed