Prescribing remedies on constitution also sometime work. This is very strnage to me, as I believe in symptoms and mostly prescribe on symptomatic way.

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<b>Sam Symptomatologist and homeopathician</b>

that is certain.

perhaps it would help you to think of "constitutional remedies" as referencing the simillimum, descriptively, namely in context of the constitutional elements that help shape the disease picture, and hence the selection of the remedy most similar: you don't have to treat 'constitution' to perceive its influence in transient states.

in the famous bruising pain from falling downstairs, arnica may be the (acute) similimum, yet be but little influenced, if at all, by constitutional factors. on the other hand, frustration and irritibility in deVito will look quite different than frustration and irritibility in either schwarzenneger or weitbrecht, based in part on constitutional disposition: is he erratic, explosive, withdrawn, insecure, arrogant....

bach

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.

Excuse me for interrupting...Can someone who understands the difference between hahnemannian and kentian explain what symptoms the kentians would consider that the hahnemannians would not consider? Or vice versa. Maybe using bach's case as an example?

bach--

I believe, that if you understand what constitution is , and if you understand what remedies do, and if you understand what remedies can do, and not do,by their virtues, you will understand, that Constitution cannot be treated with remedies.

There are some fundamental things in homeopathy, which determine what a remedy is, the way it is established, what disease is, and in which way the remedy is to be chosen in the case of disease to work curatively. These fundamentals not only outline the aplicability of homeopathy, but also limit it in its use as a method of cure.
The limitation is, that homeopathy is only aplicable to diseases-- and not to other things which may happen in live and couse suffering as well such as age, death, not getting what one wants etc.

A ''HEILMITTEL''[remedy]is a substance with curing capabilities, not to get mixed up with MEDIKAMENT [medicine] which is a substance capable of altering ones state of health.
A medicament becomes a remedy by its homeopathic aplication in the case of disease,-- it stays medicine by the allopathic use! It stayes medicine in all the other uses-- ONLY in the use in disease it becomes REMEDY!! In order to be curative of constitution this would mean, that there is something disease-kind in the constitution, which expresses itself in signs and symptoms as an expression of the disturbed liveforce, where the selection of the medication is based on to become a remedy-- but there is nothing to cure in the Constitution, as it is not disease and has no dynamis.
So-- a Constitutional remedy is an unthinkable thing, is non-sensical, imposssible--

Maybe an example may help--
Blue eyes is a constitutional sign.
blue eyes cannot be cured, as they are not a disease-- Blue eyes cannot be altered by remedies because there is NO remedy to my knowledge who has caused blue eyes in the proving.
Or: the physical hight is constituional-- the shape of your head-- the form of your ears-- the fingerprints-- all these personal hallmarks which hardly ever change are desribed as constitution.

Otherwise there is no other way, than to study for yourself the rules and principles of homeopathy and then run these against the term constitution --, then you will see for yourself.

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Hans Weitbrecht
Consultant Homeopath
homeopathy study guide: http://www.homeopathyworldcommunity....hy-study-guide

Hey there bach. This is just my opinion so you can do with it what you will but I do not follow the thinking of "constitutional" prescribing. I guess a persons "constitution" to me is their healthy state and something we wouldnot look to prescribe on. The similimum absolutely changes throughout a persons life. Effected by environment and circumstances - absolutely. In my own life I can see two very clear similimums for different time periods. When I was young I was very "phos" and for my teen years/early twenties I went into an ARS state for a long time. I wish I knew homeopathy back then because now I don't have a clear picture. When I speak of an Ars state and a phos state I am not referring to acutes but to years long chronic conditions.

DOn't get hung up on the worry of constitutions, etc. Just prescribe on the symptoms - the clear clues the body is giving you.

well, if by constitution you get no more ambiguous than blue eyes and fingerprints, i'd have no problem with your position.

but then the concept of constitution would be pretty useless. of course, you yourself have already gone a little further, in considering the possible presence or absence of dynamis in obesity, so we see there is a little gray area that has already been introduced: sometimes something is constitutional, sometimes symptomatic.

i'd suggest that the gray area can be expanded to included underlying qualities of 'personality' - think of personal acquaintances, some of who may be gregarious and others timid, some possessed of sharp wit, others who are dull. or consider, why is danny devito a good fit for one role, and arnold schwarzenneger a good fit for another, and Mr. Rogers for yet a third? and when in real life they fall ill, for example with the flu, and they become irritable, how does the 'constitutional' or relatively fixed character of their demeanor (for want of a better word) affect the way in which they express, or don't express, their state of mind? maybe one who is innately pretty timid and obsequious, would suppress his irritability altogether, though the keen homeopathic observer might nevertheless discern certain indications of its presence.

this is what i referred to when i said, to be more clear than apparently i was, i am not suggesting that remedies treat constitution, but that constitution influences the forms of illness that we encounter, one individual to the next.

i would consider, in this context, that elements of 'personality' (or demeanor, or mind, or character, or some other term) are perfectly analogous to physical anatomy, as is seen in the evolutionary pre-adaptedness of so many behaviors, which may be considered 'forms' or 'features' of the organism, but forms with a 'dynamic structure' rather than a material anatomy. these forms are variable from one individual to another, yet are characteristic in their varying realization for each individual (i.e., are 'constitutional' dispositions), and further are characteristic of the species as a whole: e.g., the use of abstract language...or the species-specific characteristic that individuals tend to affiliate to social groups, and that in doing so, individuals will present differing 'styles' of functioning, differing constitutional behavior patterns, in fact, such as leadership, follower, rebel, comformist, mediator....

i would also suggest that most elements of 'constitution' are in a pretty constant state of flux, with greater or lesser degrees of dynamis present, in short, that perfect homeostasis is not achievable; at what point a disturbance to a homeostatic balance passes over the threshhold from 'healthy' to 'ill' is certainly not going to be easy to define, but the threshhold is nevertheless there.

it might be helpful if you could identify features of 'personality' or 'temperament' or 'mind' (or another term of your choosing) that you would consider fixed enough to be considered part of the 'constitution.' or do you really limit 'constitution' to fingerprints and the like?

bach

[ 25. December 2003, 05:47: Message edited by: bwv11 ]

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.

hi barb,

i certainly agree that one prescribes on symptoms, though i seem to have been misunderstood on that point.

moving past that, however, i think your observations raise a complicating question: what is the relationship or correspondence between pathological states and constitution: specifically, how are chronic (or even miasmatic) complaints and the prescribed simillimum for them related to 'constitution' as compared to acute conditions? my own expectation would be that the simillimum for chronic complaints would tend to be relatively more fixed over time, as compared to remedies prescribed acutely. does this mean that chronic diseases, or miasmatic diseases, are more closely associated to basic constitution of the individual? and that prescriptions for chronic complaints would more closely reflect underlying (i.e., foundational, non-symptomatic) constitutional characteristics of the individual, as compared to an acute prescription? my guess would be yes ... but i think that's all i should venture say on that subject for now, as anything more would take us very, very far afield....

bach

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"The need to perform adjustments for covariates...weakens the findings." BMJ Clinical Evidence: Mental Health, (No. 11), p. 95.... It's that simple, guys: bad numbers make bad science.

WEll..as I understand it..if you're a jerk..you're a jerk. Being a jerk is not a disease. If you always snap at everyone in your well state...thats you and not something to be cured with a remedy. If robert de niro is normally assertive and takes the lead in most situations...then when he gets sick..he is mild and yielding..the remedy has to consider the mildness and yieldingness...because those characteristics came along with disease symtoms. But if you're snappish normally and you're snappish when you're sick...its not important..or not very important...just how important it is or isn't...not real sure...And this is where I wonder if Kentians would take this into consideration where the classisists wouldn't.If I'm calling kentians non classical in error ..forgive me..but I think the mental/emotional is the most important aspect of kent's cases. But the classisists will come to a remedy without m/e if there is nothing significant there..So any homeopath will consider the change in the mental/emotional sphere.. But without that...if robert de niro had burning/itching eczema all over his face..but he still was his normal aggressive, get the job done in any fashion, ruthless or not...lets say he is irritated by the eczema cause he has a movie role coming up....but he gets irritated normally by any thing that slows up the job...then that irritation is .....a. not to be cured?. b. to consider when coming up with a remedy(he is demanding the doctor find a remedy quickly and get the eczema taken care of..)..Has the homeopath not done his job by finding out what robert is normally like? Or are there certain circumstances where one would consider robert's normal state of mind in a disease state.

Anyway...sort of interested in some shedding of light.

Hope this has something to do with what you're talking about neil.

If the behavior/response is inappropriate to the stimulus, then it is something to be cured. Snapping at everyone is curable. If you are a jerk, why are you a jerk? If you were raised by people who didn't teach you social graces, that's one thing, but not seeing that your jerkishness is interfering with the fullfillment of your life is a problem. If you're, jerk because you think everyone is against you and you have to get them before they get you, then that is a dis-eased state and should be part of the case.

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Shirley Reischman

I'm in agreement with you there, Shirley!

Whenever provings are done we can see that remedies can actually produce a whole spectrum of variety in any given symptom--eg. either milk and milk products are highly desired, or they are thought of as revolting; there is a high tolerance or a very low tolerance of dairy--either way, both states can be produced by the same remedy.

Same thing, with emotions: we see, in remedies, mental states which are gracious, compassionate, loyal, and steadfast--and we also see, in the same remedy, the production of mental states which are completely the opposite (rudeness, indifference, suspiciousness leading to betrayal, and non-commital states of mind). This is because human beings can express the range of these traits freely--the key is knowing whether or not a healthy state has become one that is diseased. Look at a remedy like Nitric Acid, for example, which I would think is a good example for the mental states listed above--some people understand that, constitutionally, a person who needs Nitric Acid as a similimum will often be compensated in state--they strive to be, and decide to be, the very best people they can be in themselves...but in a state of chronic or acute disease, where they are unable to understand that their behaviour is hindering their lives andhealth, their best qualities seem to disappear.

I think we may be stuck on a point of semantics here--certainly, a healthy person never needs to be treated. But, constitutional prescribing means understanding the totality of the person in front of you---knowing how healthy behaviour changes to behaviour which speaks of, and perpetuates, disease. And maybe even understanding how that change comes about.

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Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.<br />C.G.Jung