Hi David,

Thank you for posting this.

I disagree on the 100 homeopaths prescribing 20 different remedies for the same case. The number's always been closer to 70 different rems for the same case--usually all of them pretty good prescriptions, if you "look at the case the right way".....

Divina

...and by definition, only one of them is the similimum

THE MOST SIMILAR REMEDY TO THE DISEASE

This can change over time, but at a given time, there is only one similimum.

Wishy washy hippy all inclusive love in cannabis induced anything goes darling "homoeopathy" is not the way to cure people.

THIS LAST COMMENT ABOVE "Wishy washy...etc" I WOULD LIKE TO APOLOGISE FOR.
REGARDLESS OF MY DISAGREEMENT WITH THE METHODS OF SOME OTHERS, I REALISE ALL THOSE POSTING HERE HAVE THE SERIOUS INTENTION TO HEAL.

[This message has been edited by Anna Bryant (edited 21 January 2001).]

I brought this point up in another thread and I thought I might see if anyone is up to discussing it seperately.

I am sure a lot of people get confused watching all the trained professional homoeopaths here making different prescriptions, and then arguing about who is right. I'm sure it makes us sound like it is impossible to get any agreement amongst practitioners.

The reason for this, I believe, is that there is a tendency for homoeopaths to describe the patient as a remedy, rather than saying the patient needs the remedy. It is an important differentiation to make though. This is because a patient is not a remedy - a remedy is stable and predictable, a person is changing, adapting, growing, and most of all complex. A person comes in contact with many events and traumas in their life, a remedy does not. A remedy stays the same throughout time, a person does not.

A person has a particular state, a disease if you will, that is uniquely there own. What we attempt to do is find a remedy that most closely matches that state. However, it is unlikely that you will find one that covers every single symptom the person has. So what we do is attempt to find the most important parts of the case and prescribe on those. This is where practitioners truly differ.

Any homoeopath will have a particular idea about the central part of the case. A homoeopath's education affects this, as does his or her experience. Someone may see pathology as being important, some may see the emotional distress, some may see food cravings and temperature sensitivities. This will affect the remedy chosen.

Now, a number of remedies may actually help the patient, because they are aimed at different parts of the case. The Law of Similars allows a remedy to improve the person based on how closely it resembles the "inner disturbance". This amount of improvement depends on how close it is.

One remedy may give a 70% improvement, but do no more. Another may give 50%, while a third might only give 30%. If the patient is left this way, chances are they will relapse eventually. The remedy, once repetition and higher doses are tried without success, often needs to be changed, based on whatever symptoms are left. This is the idea behind complementary and miasmatic remedies. Most patients need more than one remedy over the length of their treatment.

I stress to my patients not to focus on the remedy I am giving them. It is merely the tool I use to get them well. I prefer to have them focus on me, on the information they give me, and the change they experience in their symptoms. If an electrician comes to fix your house, do you focus on which tool he is using, or on the result he obtains? If a counsellor makes you feel better, do you concern yourself with the method or the improvement you feel?

I still discuss the remedy and the reasons I have chosen it, and allow the patient to offer their opinion of my choice, but always focus on my reasons for giving it, not whether they want Lycopodium or Phosphorous or whatever.

I have patients who have had vast improvements in their self confidence on a particular remedy, but go no further. A new remedy may make further improvements. This is a process, with the remedies helping them along the way. If I had tried the second remedy first, perhaps the improvement would have moved at a different rate. Who is to know.

What this means is that several homoeopaths can be "right" at the same time, because the particular tool they choose will be effective,just in varying degrees. If this were not true, then Homoeopathy would not be so effective, as so many different remedies are prescribed. Just go to a seminar where video cases are shown, and watch 100 homoeopaths make 20 different remedy suggestions!!!

If only one remedy could work, then there would be no way so many homoepaths could get good results. It is not a matter of who is right. You will probably find the more experience a practitioner has, the better the initial result is, but even one of less experience will still get a result, they may just need a little more time to completely resolve the case.

This has been a bit long winded, but I hope it helps those not trained to prescribe why we spend so much time discussing different remedies when looking at the same information.


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David Kempson
Dip.Homoeopathic Medicine
Member A.H.A(Australia)

Thanks DavidJK
People are very complex as you say. Our lives are complex too with several things going on at one time. So when treating a patient the current symptoms may not be the actual disease. It might be an underlying problem. For example; if one has a lot of pain the patient may only be able at that time to tell about the obvious symptoms uppermost on his mind, pain. So treating the acute pain will still leave the basic illness. However some homeopaths have the ability to understand and treat the inner problem first and thereby the patient becomes well faster as the pain symptoms will have been effectively eliminated at the cause and not given a pallative treatment. So an experienced homeopaths choice may be very different from a newer praticioner. They both may reach the same end result but treating the actual cause will restore the patient to well being faster.
David what are your comments on this? Does this make sense to you.

Hi David,

Isn't it so that a homeopath must keep learning about human nature ? To achieve this, contact with people is necessary. Of course, the symptom picture is important in any given case and the first thing a homeopath has to go on, but the other senses of the homeopath need to be sharpened too.
As it has been said, homeopathy can cure the person and not the disease. Intuition and insight is needed for starters and also knowledge of psychology and the workings of the personalities (I suggest looking into the Enneagram here) are of utmost importance.

The underlying picture in any person can come forth and show itself. The more a practitioner works on his/her own personality quirks, the more personal growth there is, the clearer can he/she perceive what the problem is with the patient.
If this is not the case, often projection is happening and the required "non-judgmental attitude" in case-taking, case analysis and prescribing is not given no matter how hard the homeopath tries to achieve this. If he knows himself well, he can discern and know about his reactions to the patient.

To understand and grasp the signature (essence) of a remedy is one thing, to understand the signature or the essence of a human being another and way more difficult to achieve. In order to understand human nature, a homeopath must begin with understanding himself and then, when this is achieved he also needs a whole lot of flexibility to remain open to the varying signatures of the the patients. I believe that only inner growth as well as continuous practise and contact with patients face to face can give him what he needs to really be successful - experience.

What do you think ?
Claudia

Dear Cib,

it is true the more experienced the homoeopath, usually the quicker they are able to perceive the true nature of the illness, and thus come to a more complete remedy sooner. But I guess I am also saying that not all other remedies given are merely palliative, but can have a strengthening effect. Some homoeopaths give the miasmatic remedy first, rather than the remedy most indicated by the symptoms. Some people may give the remedy specific for the trauma (grief or concussion) to remove any blockage to cure, while others will antidote any previous treatments. All these approaches will have a positive effect, but may not actually cure.

And Claudia,

I absolutely agree with you on understanding human nature. This is vital for treating patients, especially when dealing with emotional issues. However, remember, not every homoeopath agrees with focussing on the mental sphere, some choose to focus on pathology or physicals, so there idea would be very different there.

And Anna,

I agree there is probably only one similimum, but it is not always possible to see it immediately. This does not mean other remedies will not help the patient, while we continue to observe and examine them. And in cases where a patient needs several remedies over time, where they have a number of pathologies, emotional issues, traumas, who is to say which remedy will work first?

As an example, I treated a woman who had fear of the dark, fear of being alone, better for company, sympathetic, worse for fasting, better for eating, sweet cravings,always running herself down, with Phos for 2 years, and it always helped her. But after a time it became evident that it was not completing the cure. One day she came in with an acute attack of vomiting, the most unusual symptom of which was Nausea with hunger. I gave her Valerian, which also covered the fear of being alone in the dark, and it not only cured the acute but totally resolved the fear , which has not reoccured in over a year. After that I moved to Mur-ac for the reoccurring bouts of exhaustion, which has now also resolved her tendency to put herself out for others at the expense of her own time and energy. There were indications for all 3 of these remedies at all times in the case, but I needed all of them to clear the case. Perhaps the cure would have moved differently if I had given Valer first, but without the acute presentation I did not perceive it. Perhaps if Mur-ac had been given first things might have gone at a different pace, but until the fear had gone, it was difficult to understand why she was always exhausting herself.

If there was only ever one choice, and most homoeopaths disagree over that choice, then that would mean that most homoeopaths are not getting any cures, and that only a very few are. When we get a remedy and it works, we can assume that is the only remedy that would have worked, but other homoeopaths would have chosen a different remedy and still got a result. You cannot know that no other remedy would not have worked. What if the similimun has not been discovered yet, if it is a substance that has not been proven? Then that patient would be untreatable by us.

Many homoeopaths choose to ignore the success that others have in practice, using different remedies. It should not be threatening in any way, but should be encouraging, that perhaps homoeopathy is not quite so difficult as we think.(still not easy though!!) By saying "there is only one right answer and it is mine" we are denying the obvious truth....

other people make different prescriptions, improve people's health, and run sucessful practices.

By accepting this, perhaps we can stop fighting over who is right, and start learning from other's successes. And if that is "hippyish", to strive for understanding and acceptance amongst homoeopaths, then I guess I am guilty as charged.


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David Kempson
Dip.Homoeopathic Medicine
Member A.H.A(Australia)

David I am pretty sure you have hit the nail right on the head ,,,,,,,must be great to be your patient

David,

I am so glad that you are sharing your wisdom with us. I agree wholeheartedly that people should not be defined by a remedy. Kirkegaard said, "When you label me, you negate me," and all too often these remedy labels carry some negative connotations because they correspond with the pathologies that people have, and not the people themselves. Furthermore, I believe that this classification approach takes us a step back from the Newtonian paradigm of allopathic medicine into an Aristotelian view, in which the world is seen in terms of categories. What we need to do is move forward into the new physics of the 20th Century where the universe is understood as the dynamic interplay of energies in which nothing is static or disconnected from the whole. It is on this energetic level that the remedies work and so it is fitting that more than one remedy is needed to complete a cure.

I am a lay person who works with miasmic cases and in my experience, many remedies are needed to peel away the layers of pathology. In fact, it required three remedies to cure my cat's urinary problem! Not because I was prescribing wrongly but because I believe that this is a fundamental law of cure that has yet to be discovered (actually, I think the early homeopaths understood this much better).

As for there being only one true simillimum at any given time, I believe that that is the case. However, as you point out, it is frequently very difficult to know what it is. Even the wrong remedies (or partial simillimums) will move the case forward because they are stimulating the vital force.

And lastly, you make a wonderful point about stopping all this ridiculous fighting about who is right and learning from each other's successes. Isn't the purpose of discussion to expand and grow, rather than fight and bicker? And if that is "hippyish", then I too am guilty as charged. However, I would prefer to think that it is just wiser because, generally, people do not change as a result of being told they are "wrong".

David, thank you for this wonderful thread. I hope we will be hearing more from you in the future.


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"We must never regard this medicine as ours - we are merely channels through which the Great Power helps other people achieve a state of well-being in mind, body, and soul."

[This message has been edited by nrg grl (edited 21 January 2001).]

Personally, i wouldnt be a patient under a homeopath, who edit repertories at his own liking, and removes keyrubrics from them, how, can sutch a "homeopat" ever find the simillimum?
And as he so correctly say, many is called homeopaths, that dont find anything, quite correct, yes.
Is it any wonder, when they act like this?

If the premises are:

1. That there is only one similimum at a given time.

2. That the similumum for a given patient can change over time.

3. That remedies other than the similimum, if they are quite close can either suppress or expose the symptoms.

Then there appears to be no disagreement on the issues raised in this thread.

The question of whether near-miss remedies suppress or reveal the needed remedy is problematic.
Sometimes near remedies can stimulate the vitality to reveal the full case as nrg suggests. At other times near remedies can suppress and hide symptoms that are keys to the similimum. It's a fine line, and the latter is best avoided by not repeating suppressive remedies for the sake of suppression, mistaking it for cure.