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Homeopathy |
| Fundamentals |
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The fundamentals of Homeopathy as
laid down by Hahnemann are as follows:
- There is a natural and universal
scientific law of cure, namely, that likes can be cured by likes. This means
that small amounts of any substance which causes disease in a healthy person,
can be used to treat that same disease in a patient.
- The knowledge of the
action of remedies is harvested from single and double blinded experiments in
which small doses are given to healthy subjects who later record their detailed
reactions to the test substance. This is called a homeopathic proving. The
knowledge base for a particular substance is culled from case histories of
treatment with medicines that have not undergone a proving but which have
yielded a cure in clinical practice. To this is added the information of
symptoms produced by accidental poisonings with toxic substances. The provings,
clinical and toxicological data form the materia medica of the remedy.
- The
ability of the organism to feel, sense, act, or achieve homeostasis is
maintained by a non-material principle called the dynamis.
This dynamis
or spirit-like vital force is, according to Hahnemann, similar in nature to
forces involved in gravity or magnetism. It is a force, which to date,
has illuded explanation or classification by the natural sciences.
Diseases, therefore, are not actual material things, rather they are
descriptions or classifications of symptom patterns. Symptoms are not
things to be removed or suppressed by drugs, rather they are an
expression of or the language of the vital force's attempts to heal.
The properly prepared, selected and administered homeopathic remedy
somehow "resonates" with the vital force and stimulates the healing
process. Remedy selection is accomplished by closely matching the
remedy picture of the disease to the symptom picture of the remedy.
- A single remedy at a
time is given since two or more remedies cannot be the most similar to
the disease. Single remedy administration also allows a clear
evaluation of its efficacy.
- A minimum dose must be
used. Small doses of a substance stimulate healing, medium doses
paralyze the patient and large doses can kill.
- Individualization of
the treatment is essential. No two people are exactly alike in either
sickness or in health and although homeopaths use classifications of
disease types, finer individual distinctions must always be made
since, although the action of two remedies may often be similar, they
are never exactly the same.
- The mere removal of
symptoms by suppressive means is a grave danger in that it defeats the
vital force's attempt at homeostasis and puts the patient at risk for
a more serious disease.
- That there is a
distinction between acute or epidemic diseases and chronic disease
patterns of patients. Preventive homeopathic care requires an
understanding of these chronic patterns.
