What is Homeopathy?
Homeopathy is a form of medicine whose core values are even older than the father of medicine (Hippocrates). It aims to treat and uses drugs made from natural things such as food, plant species, herbs and mineral resources in accordance with natural laws of healing.
The German doctor, Samuel Christian Friedrich Hahnemann, “discovered” Homeopathy in the early 1800s. He got frustrated with medicine and for good reason shortly after he began to practice.
The humors were part of the old practice which stated that good health was the result of a balance of liquids and fluids found in our body that had to be taken out from the body by every possible means. To achieve this, patients were treated by using very painful methods like cauterization, blistering, purging and bleeding.
Principles of Homeopathy
The Law of Similars
The word “homeopathy” originated from Greek homoios (similar) and pathos (suffering or illness) The core principle on which homeopathy is focused is the law of similars or “Like is cured by like”. The Similar Law states that a treatment will cure an illness if it causes symptoms similar to that of the infection in a healthy person.
The law works in this way: a person develops a fever, flushed face, expanded pupils, fast heartbeat and an unrestful feeling.
The homeopathic practitioner examines all of these indications and then finds a medicine that has developed all of these symptoms in a healthy person in medically controlled conditions.
The fever will drop to normal and the person feels well within a short time after taking the medication. The Similar Law allows the homeopathic practitioner to choose the remedy required to match the individual’s symptoms with the effects the treatment causes.
The Law of Proving
The second homeopathy principle, the law of proving, refers to the way a medication is tested to determine its effect. In order to prove a remedy, a daily dose of the drug is administered to each group of healthy individuals and each team closely records their symptoms. According to the traditional double-blind approach, roughly half of the research group used in the research experiments are given a placebo or an unmedicated pill.
Once the proving has been concluded, all of the symptoms experienced regularly by the research group such as dizziness, loss of consciousness and restlessness are listed as a distinctive remedy in the Materia Medica reference. For the treatment of the patient, the practitioner reviews the treatment option in the Materia Medica and if the symptoms match applies the law of similars.
In standard medical research, new medicines are first tested on animals because of their adverse effects. Homeopathic practitioners do not use animal subjects for testing their medication since they do not react to chemicals as human beings do. Homeopathic medicines are generally considered safe, don’t have the dangerous side effects and are not toxic.
The Law of Potentization (the Minimum Dose)
The third law, the law of potentization, mentions how a homeopathic remedy is prepared. Each remedy is prepared in a monitored process of successive dilutions alternating with succussion(shaking). This process is then continued until no molecules of the original ingredient remain in the final resulting medicine. These small doses are known as potencies. Small Dilutions are known as low potencies and larger dilutions as high potencies. It may seem weird that the greater the dilution, the greater the strength or potency of the medicine. But this is how homeopathic medicine works.
The process of potentization makes it possible to use many materials such as certain metals, charcoal and sand. These materials used alone can be dangerous in their original state. A potentized remedy does not contain sufficient matter to act directly on the tissues. This means that homeopathic medicine is nontoxic and cannot cause side effects. According to different studies in over 150 years of use, no homeopathic remedy has ever been recalled.
The Single Remedy
Most homeopaths usually give only one remedy at a time. This is contrary to the current medical practice of frequently prescribing two or more medicines at one time. This is will ensure what the effect of the single remedy will be on a patient. Finding out the effect of two remedies is difficult and its hard to find out which one is working. By using a single remedy the effect of that remedy can be easily proven. The single remedy can be proved and tested on healthy subjects.
A good homeopathic physician will always start with single remedies according to your symptoms. The result is carefully monitored and a good medicine thus is given to the patient.
