<< BACK What Kinds of Diseases Can Homeopathy Treat? >>

Homeopathy is a scientific system of medicine based on the discovery that a medicinal substance can cure the same problems it can cause - by varying the dosage of that substance.

Any herb, mineral or animal product given to a healthy person in a suitable dose will eventually cause that person to experience symptoms.  These symptoms will be specific to the particular substance taken.  That is, each substance produces in the healthy individual symptoms unique to that substance.

Now, here's the interesting part:  That same substance, in an extremely tiny dose, will remove just those symptoms it is capable of producing. 

When Dr. Samuel Hahnemann, the originator of homeopathy, made this observation 200 years ago, he stated it as a principle which became his Law of Similars:   "Let likes be treated by likes."

A simple example of Hahnemann's Law is drinking too much coffee.  For one person it may be a sip or two; for another, a full pot.  Whatever the amount, familiar symptoms will appear.  At first, alertness is increased.  Later, the mind races, preventing sleep, setting the nervous system on edge, and causing anxiety.  According to homeopathy the best antidote to coffee poisoning is - coffee.  However, only a very small amount (one drop or less) will reverse the effects - and then only if that drop is suitably prepared according to exact homeopathic instructions.

Another example is a cook slicing an onion.  Her eyes burn and water profusely; her nose is affected with sneezing and watering.  If a person has not been cutting onions but experiences these symptoms, he or she is probably suffering from allergies or the common cold.  As one might expect, one remedy for such a condition is the onion - again a minute amount prepared according to exact homeopathic instructions.

You Mention Herbs.  Is Homeopathy Like Herbal Medicine?

Many homeopathic medicines originate from herbs, but after they are prepared homeopathically they have quite different actions from natural herbs (i.e., the ones you buy in the health food store).  The same goes for minerals.  Once they are prepared homeopathically, common minerals such as calcium carbonate have their own specific actions - quite unlike their effects on the body when they are taken as nutritional supplements.  (See the section which follows on microdoses.)

Where Does Homeopathy Come From?

The German physician Samuel Hahnemann, born in 1753, made a critical observation in the 1790s when he experimented on himself by taking the drug Cinchona Bark which contains quinine.  At the time, Hahnemann was translating a medical text concerning Cinchona from English into German.  The English text seemed to contradict his own earlier experience with Cinchona, which he had taken when he was ill with intermittent fever (malaria).

To verify what he was translating, Hahnemann decided to take Cinchona in spite of the fact that he was perfectly healthy.  To his interest and surprise, he soon fell ill with symptoms indistinguishable from intermittent fever.  He discontinued the medicine and returned to health.

Hahnemann wondered if the reason Cinchona worked against intermittent fever was because it caused very similar symptoms in a healthy person.  He gave it to other healthy persons; they, too, fell sick as though with intermittent fever.  We can only imagine his excitement at this discovery, one of the most significant in the history of medicine.

Hahnemann continued to experiment (primarily on himself), testing various herbal and mineral substances.  Without discriminating between physical, mental, and emotional symptoms, he noted all of the symptoms produced by each medicine in meticulous detail.  He found that no two substances produced exactly the same set of symptoms;  rather, each caused its own unique pattern of symptoms.

Eventually Hahnemann formulated his Law of Similars, and he began to treat sick people.

How Do Homeopathic Medicines Work?

Hahnemann postulated that in giving a sick person a medicine known to produce symptoms similar to what he was suffering, he was substituting a temporary drug disease for the natural disease.  This drug disease, he maintained, was more powerful than the natural disease and would drive it out.

From our perspective in the late twentieth century, we reason that the homeopathic medicine strengthens the immune system - enabling it to better fight the disease.  But the homeopathic medicine is not limited to strengthening just the immune system.  All systems (nervous, endocrine, respiratory, cardiovascular, musculoskeletal, etc.) are strengthened and balanced.  These different systems then work to restore the person to health.  It is important to realize that often the entire organism is improved by the homeopathic medicine.  Many of the beneficial effects are, therefore, mental and emotional as well as physical.

Does Homeopathy Then Work On the Whole Person?

Yes.  In classical homeopathy the prescription is based not only on a patient's physical symptoms but on all his or her symptoms.  A person's mental and emotional state count as much or more than the physical condition when deciding on which medicine to prescribe.  The correct medicine improves the mental state at the same time it is healing the physical condition.  Conversely, if the problem is primarily mental, the medicine helps the physical side at the same time the mental condition is being healed.  Homeopathy is truly holistic.

Why Are Homeopathic Medicines Prepared in Microdoses?

Hahnemann found that often there would be a temporary worsening of the very symptoms he was attempting to cure, so he experimented by diluting the medicine, making it smaller.   At a certain point it ceased to act.

Then Hahnemann did something never before tried in the history of medicine.  He forcibly shook the medicine every time he diluted it.  Holding the vial of diluted medicine in his fist he struck that hand against a heavy book ten or twenty times.  This he called succussion.  Every dilution was succussed.  After diluting and succussing a medicine he noticed that instead of having a weaker effect, it had a stronger one!  From then on Hahnemann prepared all  medicines by dilution and succussion.  They are still prepared in this manner today.

A diluted and succussed medicine is called a potentized medicine.  All homeopathic medicines are potentized.  Hahnemann noted that potentized medicines acted more forcefully than they did in the gross form, and that the more a medicine was diluted and succussed, the stronger its action.  He found that smaller was not weaker but stronger.  In fact, medicines became more active the more they were diluted and succussed.  Homeopathic medicines are often so dilute that not a single molecule of the original substance is left

Is Homeopathic  Medicine "Energy" Medicine?

Because homeopathic medicines are diluted to the point where no molecules remain, we postulate that they cannot act biochemically and, therefore, must react energetically with the body's subtle (meaning immeasurable) energies.  It may very well be that what the homeopathic medicine is affecting is what the acupuncturists call the "chi."  Whatever it is, it cannot, as yet, be quantified and measured.

Doesn't That Suggest Homeopathy is Really Only the Placebo Effect?

A placebo is a dummy medicine.  Many people have reported improvements after taking a placebo thinking it was a real medicine.  There are good reasons to think that homeopathic medicines are not placebos.  First, they act on infants, animals and unconscious patients.  Second, patients frequently report feeling worse (the homeopathic aggravation)  before they begin to improve.  This initial worsening occurs even when they have not been told to expect it.

Though we do not know how homeopathic medicines work, it is clear from the clinical results of the last 200 years that they do act to cure sick people.   It should be mentioned that the pharmacology of most drugs is not completely understood which in no way keeps doctors from prescribing them.

Is Homeopathy a Scientific System of Medicine, or Is it Based More on the Intuition of the Practitioner?

Homeopathy as a system is based on provings.  It is the provings of medicines that form the scientific basis of homeopathy.  Each medicine has been "proved" to elicit symptoms in several or many provers.  In a proving, a homeopathic medicine is given to healthy persons.  Whatever symptoms they develop are carefully noted by trained observers.  The provers (those taking the homeopathic medicine) tend to manifest many symptoms in common.

Provings comprise our homeopathic data bank, and they are the results of careful observations.  This experimental data allows us to deduce that a particular medicine caused those symptoms in healthy persons and will, therefore, cure those same symptoms when given to a sick person.

Every homeopathic medicine has been proved on healthy human volunteers.  Note how different this is from pharmacological testing which is always done first on animals.  Why animals?  Because many pharmacologicals are toxic.   Homeopathic medicines are proved on humans because they are nontoxic and perfectly safe.

Provings result in many interesting mental and emotional symptoms as well as physical ones.  People can describe very subtle feelings and sensations.  Animals cannot.  Sensations and mental symptoms can be of critical importance when it comes to selecting the most appropriate medicine as sickness invariably affects the intellectual faculties, the emotions and the body.

Most provings were done in the nineteenth century and we still refer to them today.  They have withstood the test of time.  Compare homeopathic medicines to pharmacologicals which rarely stay in vogue a decade, let alone a century.

The classical homeopath spends years studying the symptoms associated with each medicine.  Some homeopathic medicines literally have been proved to cause hundreds of symptoms so mastering these medicines takes time and effort.  What might appear as a flash of intuitive brilliance is usually an insight born of intense study.

How Does a Homeopath Differ From an Allopath (Conventional M.D.)?

The allopath views diseases as localizing in various organs and systems, and uses specific drugs to suppress those diseases.  The homeopath, while not unconcerned with the localizing pathology, believes the core problem lies in what some call the central disturbance.  The central disturbance is a mind-body disorder.  In turn it has been caused by the disordered Vital Force, that energy which governs all the body's systems and all the billions of biochemical reactions.  Correct the Vital Force and the central disturbance will diminish, and the organism will begin to heal.

The allopath, being system oriented, sees high blood pressure as related to the renovascular system, colitis to the gastrointestinal system, arthritis to the joints, and so on.  So the allopath selects an organ-specific or system-specific drug to suppress the annoying symptoms. He virtually never makes a connection between the patient's mental state and the pathology.

The homeopath invariably does.  The homeopath cringes at the very idea of suppression.   Always his therapy is directed toward building up the immune (and other) systems, never in suppressing them.

Because the allopath is organ and system oriented he often prescribes more than one medicine, one for each organ or system affected.  The patient with arthritis, high blood pressure, insomnia and anxiety could easily be given aspirin or ibuprofen for the arthritis, a diuretic and antihypertensive for the blood pressure, a barbiturate to sleep and a tranquilizer for anxiety - a total of five drugs for four problems.

The classical homeopath, on the other hand, would treat the same patient with only one medicine at a time intending to stimulate the body's own natural defenses (immune system, nervous system, endocrine system, etc.) to overcome all of the patient's problems at the same time.

What's the Difference Between Homeopathy and Immunizations?  Between Homeopathy and Allergy Desensitization?

In modern immunizations either attenuated (weakened) live or killed viral or bacterial products are injected.  The body reacts by making antibodies to those viruses and bacteria which afford protection against various viral and bacterial diseases.

In contrast, a homeopathic medicine is so diluted that no particulate matter remains.  Often no molecules remain.  In classical homeopathy, medicines are never injected but are given by mouth.  Whereas a vaccine causes a limited and very specific reaction from the immune system  (i.e., the production of antibodies), a  homeopathic medicine elicits a nonspecific and more general reaction which stimulates the entire immune system as well as other systems.

In allergy desensitization, the allergist uses a dilution of an allergen (allergic substance), but he does not succuss it.  Although the allergen is diluted, it is not diluted to the infinitesimally small dose the homeopath uses.  Each desensitization shot acts only against one allergen whereas the homeopathic medicine strengthens the entire immune system against all allergens.

<< BACK What Kinds of Diseases Can Homeopathy Treat? >>