The Case For Homeopathy

In light of the recent attacks on Homeopathy I want to share a wonderful article written by Dana Ullman on the Huffington Post

There has been an increasingly vocal objection to Homeopathy being fueled and funded by the pharmaceutical industry as they attempt to shut down an affordable and effective form of medicine.

Especially if you're a sceptic, do some real research, find out how many hundreds of studies in vitro, on plants, and on people, have shown Homeopathy to be effectice. Even Darwin (in his recently published letters) showed with his own experiments on plants that Homeopathy has an effect.

If you've been helped by Homeopathy Please support Patients and Practitioners of homeopathy in the UK by signing this declaration at Homeopathy Worked For Me. The UK's national health plan currently covers homeopathic treatment and citizens are at risk of loosing coverage. Even if you don't believe in Homeopathy this is about freedom of choice.

How To make A Remedy

Ok it's been a while since I posted, I've been in work mode organizing to big seminars coming up. The first a Vithoulkas video course and the second with Grant Bentley on facial diagnosis

However I just came across this great video on how to make a remedy

Preventing Infant Mortality

Ok so this isn't homeopthic - but as my new role of Doula and Homeopathic Birth Support I think this is important. The film was produced by Dona International - the main association for Doulas is North America.

Reducing Infant Mortality from Debby Takikawa on Vimeo.

More Research Supporting Homeopathy in the use of cancer

This is In vitro evidence supporting Homeopathy. Though I always question the usefullness since acurate Homeopathic prescribing is an art that takes into account all aspects of a person not just their pathology. And as a matter of fact all aspect of their experience of their pathology.

At least in-vitro studies show us that homeopathy affects cells - no placebo effect is influential.


Here's the link.

http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/6/2/257

Homeopathy for Flu Pandemics

From Andre Saine:

How does homeopathy address patients with infectious diseases? Homeopathic treatment is ideal to optimize the body's natural defenses against microbes. With the appropriate homeopathic treatment, people recover from infectious diseases, even the most serious ones, gently and rapidly. During past great epidemics such as diphtheria, scarlet fever, typhoid, cholera, yellow fever, malaria, etc., homeopathy decreased mortality by 10 to 30 times versus conventional medicine. During the infamous Spanish flu epidemic of 1918-19, it has been estimated that 25 to 50 million people died worldwide. In the United States alone, 550,000 died, approximately 10% of the people afflicted with the flu. Homeopathic physicians documented then more than 62,000 patients treated with homeopathy resulting in a mortality of 0.7%. For people who were sick enough to be hospitalized, conventional medicine had a mortality of 30% while with 27,000 documented hospitalized cases, homeopathy was reporting a mortality of 1.05% (Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy 1921; 13:1028-43).


I don't have much time right now to talk at length on my views of this Swine Flu epidemic, and to do the research needed to write a descent article (I hope to do this in the following week) But seriously, how many people die yearly in North America from the flu? And compare to how many have died from this H1N1 influenza?

Luckily the stats on Homeopathy and past flu epidemics give me the confidence to say there's nothing to fear.

Fevers

So after teaching a workshop on Homeopathy for infants with a focus on fevers I found my little one sick, and slowly after a few days developing a fever. Being a first time mom faced with my first frightening fever I forgot all that I taught in my class, threw common sense out the window and started fretting over the "very high" 40 degree fever the baby was expressing.

I called my colleague and child's homeopath like 10 times that day, and despite his comforting words and warnings not to use any remedies unless the fever got really high (isn't 40 really high?). Of course I did not listen, and soon she was getting doses of chamomila, and belladonna. Eventually in fear of another sleepless night (as I also caught the cold and the fever) I resorted to Tylenol.

I'm happy to say baby has an vibrant life force which resisted all my attempts to suppress the fever. And after a couple of exhausting days and sleepless nights the fever resolved itself. Hurray! I hope I've learned my lesson and will avoid such silly parent behaviour next time I'm confronted with a fever.

So here's my advice in the face of a fever in an infant. Stay calm. According to the telehealth nurse there is no need to worry about a fever less than 40.6 degrees Celsius. And even then you're probably ok, but contact a Dr. just in case. And of course there are the common fever remedies such as Belladonna for a sudden high fever (yes higher than 40), Aconite for first stages of a cold or fever after exposure to cold and Ferrum Phos. for a low or medium fever that comes on slowly.

But if you can help it let the fever do its thing. This is a tool the body uses to heal itself, and who knows what can happen when you try to stop the body's innate ability to heal.

Homeopathy, Scientific?

The following is a link to a letter written by Brian D. Josephson, a Nobel laureate and Welsh physicist. Here he succinctly critiques criticisms of Homeopathy, such as the idea that serial dilution is ridiculous while in fact the alleged power of the remedy is not contained in the original substance but rather in the modification of the water.

http://www.tcm.phy.cam.ac.uk/~bdj10/water.memory/ns/homeopathy.html

2.5 Million Cubans Successfully Vaccinated with Homeopathic Remedies

At a recent conference in Cuba (Dec.2008) Homeopaths from around the world presented cases of successful homeopathic prophylaxis. One of the most impressive cases presented came from Cuba itself, thanks to trade embargoes, a country free from the pressures of the pharmaceutical lobby.

Cuba suffers from yearly epidemics of Leptospirosis, a bacterial disease that can cause a variety of symptoms including: high fever, severe headache, chills, muscle aches, vomiting, jaundice, abdominal pain, diarrhea, or a rash. If the disease is not treated, the patient could develop kidney damage, meningitis , liver failure, and respiratory distress. (according to the CDC)

According to a preliminary report by the Finlay Institute:

"On October November 2007, three provinces of the eastern region of Cuba were affected by strong rainfalls causing floods of big areas and several damages to sanitary and health systems. The risk of leptospirosis infection raised extremely dangerous levels with about 2 million of peoples exposed to potentially contaminated water.

Considering this situation, the Finlay Institute prepared a leptospira nosode 200 CH using 4 circulating strains and following international quality standards. A multidisciplinary team travelled to the affected regions to conduct the massive administration of the nosode. Coordinated action with public health system infrastructures allowed the administration of a preventive treatment consisting in two doses (7- 9 days apart) of the nosode to about 2,4 million of people (4,8 million of doses). The coverage of the intervention rose up to 95% percent of total population of the three provinces at risk."


The typical expectancy of illness would have been in the thousands even with allopathic vaccinations, along with many deaths. The problem with dispensing the usual allopathic vaccination was the high cost which prevented getting the vaccination to those most at risk, namely children, pregnant women and the elderly. The usual cost for vaccinating the population is around 3 million dollars for 2.5 million people.

Following the use of the homeopathic profilaxis made from the leptospirosis bacteria in August 2007 (a time of typical high incidence thanks to hurricane season)there were only 10 cases of leptospirosis and no deaths resulting from the disease. In all of 2008 there were no deaths and rates of infection never went over 10 people per month.

This is an important historical event as such immunization would not have been allowed anywhere else.

We eagerly await the full report.

For more information check out http://homeopathyresource.wordpress.com

The Debate Continues

Online Documentaries 4 U: Homeopathy: The Test

A very insightful documentary on Homeopathic research. In many ways it shows both sides of the story - it ends however with the Famous Randi proving Homeopathy and anything beyond science's ability to explain as bogus.

Many eminent scientists have staked heir careers and public humiliation by publishing research that proves Homeopathy works. Why is it that when Randi gets involved in a scientific experiment that  demonstrated positive results repeatedly the results suddenly change? Do you really believe world class scientists aren't following proper research methodology? That their studies aren't double blind to begin with? Or perhaps Randi is sabotaging studies as his reputation, career, and money are at stake!

Anyways I post this film because it really does provide an excellent overview of Homeopathy.

New Research

Believe it or not Homeopaths are eager to embrace scientific research into their field. We too are looking for concrete evidence to support what we observe in our clinics daily and therefore bring homeopathy to the masses as a viable and important alternative. A significant resource that recently popped onto the scene is Homeonet - a Canadian research network devoted to connecting and funding researchers in Homeopathy.

Homeonet now presents the study of the month - a page that highlights one study in the field of Homeopathic Research every month. Check it out here

Homeopathy For Teething

I believe I have made an inspired and important discovery in the treatment of teething babes. Recently while in Montreal 2 friends of ours with a teething monster showed us how they wrap an ice cube in a cloth, tie it with a rubber band and give it to their 11 month old to suck on. Brilliant! We tried this at home with our little one and quickly received giggles and sqwabbles of appreciation.

Step number 2 in my great discovery was combining the lifesaving qualities of Boiron's Camilia with the clever ice trick mentioned above. Mix a vile of Camilia into the purified water going into the ice tray! Hurray happy babies everywhere!

The Lancet Can Be Wrong

A few years ago the Lancet published a meta-analysis of Homeopathic trials which claimed to show that Homeopathy is ineffective. Most people within the Homeopathic community were appalled to see how poorly the trials were chosen for this analysis.

There is a bias in medical publications against publishing anything that may prove that Homeopathy works. Often only those papers showing that homeopathy fails are published. In most of these trials Homeopathy is shown to be ineffective because they lack the individualization essential to proper homeopathic prescribing.

The following link takes you to a press release regarding 2 recent studies explaining that the Lancet paper was flawed.

enjoy

http://www.sphq.org/images/stories/Homeopathy_media_release_nov_2008.pdf