Like Cures Like
Homeopathy Respects the Body's Ability to Heal
Homeopathy is a natural pharmaceutical system that uses micro-doses of substances from plants, animals, and minerals to arouse a natural healing response in the sick patient. The homeopathic approach to healing is based on the premise of similia similibus curentur, which means let likes be cured by likes. Homeopathy considers the alterations in a patient's emotional, mental and physical state with illness or injury, and is thus considered a form of holistic medicine because it treats the whole patient. While homeopathy is an effective method of healing as a stand-alone therapy, other modalities such as chiropractic, osteopathy, rehabilitation, good nutrition and supplementation, laser and ozone therapy all complement homeopathy and support recovery. Acupuncture and homeopathy both work at the level of the vital force, or Chi, and may overwhelm a patient if used together - it is best to choose one or the other for a specific illness or injury. What about homeopathy and drug therapy? Since homeopathy relies on the symptoms and clinical signs of a patient to determine the best homeopathic prescription, and drugs are intended to suppress symptoms of illness, the patient will do best with homeopathy alone. In most cases, homeopathic prescriptions are effective without the use of drug therapy, though there are a few conditions in which the use of both drugs and homeopathy may be unavoidable. In order to better understand how homeopathy is used in veterinary medicine, it is best to begin with its definition and how it compares to the most common method of treatment in the United States today, called allopathy.
Allopathy, or contraria contrariis, is defined as a method of treatment using agents that produce effects different from those of the disease treated, such as using antibiotics to treat infections. Antipathic treatment is the use of drugs that have an opposite effect to the illness: patients with an inflammatory process or fever are prescribed anti-inflammatory drugs; auto-immune conditions are treated with drugs that suppress the immune system. Frequent repetition of the drug is often required to maintain the results, and undesirable effects of treatment, called ‘side-effects’ are commonplace and expected. It is a regular occurrence in allopathic medicine that a second or third medicine is often needed to address the side effects of the first prescription.
The homeopathic approach to sickness is based on the premise of similia similibus, or ‘similar suffering’. This method of healing is based on the understanding that no two similar diseases can exist within one patient at the same time. Thus, any medicine that can produce observable symptoms in a healthy patient will remove similar symptoms occurring as an expression of disease in the ill patient. In health, the vital force – like Chi in traditional Chinese medicine – is the energy that maintains life and homeostasis in the individual. In illness, the vital force becomes imbalanced, and symptoms are created during the vital force’s attempt to return to normal function. It is the role of the homeopathic prescriber to identify the most characteristic symptoms of the patient’s illness to identify a matching homeopathic medicine (a.k.a. remedy) which stimulates the vital force to heal itself.
Contrary to allopathic medicine, which often uses multiple drugs to suppress the symptoms of illness, homeopaths utilize signs of illness as a guide to identify a single matching medicine that would, if taken in toxic doses, cause the same symptoms of illness in a healthy patient. The preparation of a homeopathic medicine removes the toxic effects of the remedy, while stimulating the healing properties of the substance. Following the concept that two identical illnesses cannot occur in the same patient at the same time, the homeopathic medicine, which is a stronger, yet identical match to the illness takes hold of the vital force and displaces the illness. This healing response occurs without causing suffering or side effects to the patient. Within a short time, the effect of the homeopathic medicine wears off, leaving the patient healthy again.
Homeopathy is one of the oldest and most successful demonstrations of evidence-based medicine because the effects of each remedy have been proven by healthy human volunteers. In contrast, conventional drugs are tested on animals that cannot report their symptoms, or administered in drug trials to sick people who are already experiencing signs of illness and drug side effects, making accurate assessments of the primary drug effects difficult or impossible. In the same way in which they are tested, classical homeopaths are trained to be very scientific in their prescriptions, and only utilize one homeopathic medicine at a time so they can accurately interpret their patient's response to the medicine.
Dr. Iris Bell describes homeopathic healing perfectly by stating, “Homeopathic symptoms are manifestations of a singular, pervasive, emergent disturbance of the state of the individual as a whole system or network of networks, not of a specific body part or biological mechanism in isolation…A classical homeopath selects each medicine with similar properties to best match the current symptom pattern of an individual patient, rather than a given symptom in isolation. Classical homeopathy thus treats disease as an emergent behavior pattern of the individual patient as an indivisible complex adaptive system, not as isolated local symptom mechanisms. In contrast, most conventional drugs typically target only one specific receptor type, thereby suppressing specific symptoms without treating the person as an integrated whole system/network.” Simply stated, homeopaths select the single homeopathic remedy that best matches the symptoms of illness in a patient to stimulate a healing response in the body and a resultant return to health. Homeopathy respects the ability of the body to heal, addressing the underlying cause of the symptoms of illness, leaving the patient stronger and healthier after treatment.
Allopathy, or contraria contrariis, is defined as a method of treatment using agents that produce effects different from those of the disease treated, such as using antibiotics to treat infections. Antipathic treatment is the use of drugs that have an opposite effect to the illness: patients with an inflammatory process or fever are prescribed anti-inflammatory drugs; auto-immune conditions are treated with drugs that suppress the immune system. Frequent repetition of the drug is often required to maintain the results, and undesirable effects of treatment, called ‘side-effects’ are commonplace and expected. It is a regular occurrence in allopathic medicine that a second or third medicine is often needed to address the side effects of the first prescription.
The homeopathic approach to sickness is based on the premise of similia similibus, or ‘similar suffering’. This method of healing is based on the understanding that no two similar diseases can exist within one patient at the same time. Thus, any medicine that can produce observable symptoms in a healthy patient will remove similar symptoms occurring as an expression of disease in the ill patient. In health, the vital force – like Chi in traditional Chinese medicine – is the energy that maintains life and homeostasis in the individual. In illness, the vital force becomes imbalanced, and symptoms are created during the vital force’s attempt to return to normal function. It is the role of the homeopathic prescriber to identify the most characteristic symptoms of the patient’s illness to identify a matching homeopathic medicine (a.k.a. remedy) which stimulates the vital force to heal itself.
Contrary to allopathic medicine, which often uses multiple drugs to suppress the symptoms of illness, homeopaths utilize signs of illness as a guide to identify a single matching medicine that would, if taken in toxic doses, cause the same symptoms of illness in a healthy patient. The preparation of a homeopathic medicine removes the toxic effects of the remedy, while stimulating the healing properties of the substance. Following the concept that two identical illnesses cannot occur in the same patient at the same time, the homeopathic medicine, which is a stronger, yet identical match to the illness takes hold of the vital force and displaces the illness. This healing response occurs without causing suffering or side effects to the patient. Within a short time, the effect of the homeopathic medicine wears off, leaving the patient healthy again.
Homeopathy is one of the oldest and most successful demonstrations of evidence-based medicine because the effects of each remedy have been proven by healthy human volunteers. In contrast, conventional drugs are tested on animals that cannot report their symptoms, or administered in drug trials to sick people who are already experiencing signs of illness and drug side effects, making accurate assessments of the primary drug effects difficult or impossible. In the same way in which they are tested, classical homeopaths are trained to be very scientific in their prescriptions, and only utilize one homeopathic medicine at a time so they can accurately interpret their patient's response to the medicine.
Dr. Iris Bell describes homeopathic healing perfectly by stating, “Homeopathic symptoms are manifestations of a singular, pervasive, emergent disturbance of the state of the individual as a whole system or network of networks, not of a specific body part or biological mechanism in isolation…A classical homeopath selects each medicine with similar properties to best match the current symptom pattern of an individual patient, rather than a given symptom in isolation. Classical homeopathy thus treats disease as an emergent behavior pattern of the individual patient as an indivisible complex adaptive system, not as isolated local symptom mechanisms. In contrast, most conventional drugs typically target only one specific receptor type, thereby suppressing specific symptoms without treating the person as an integrated whole system/network.” Simply stated, homeopaths select the single homeopathic remedy that best matches the symptoms of illness in a patient to stimulate a healing response in the body and a resultant return to health. Homeopathy respects the ability of the body to heal, addressing the underlying cause of the symptoms of illness, leaving the patient stronger and healthier after treatment.
