F A Q - Frequently asked questions in Homeopathy

Can Homeopathy treat all health problems?


Yes. Homeopathy is a complete Medicinal System in itself. Only in very rare cases and circumstances help of surgery is required under Homeopathy treatment.

Is it True that Homeopathy is a slow system of cure?


No. In fact it is the fastest and lasting to heal/give relief to the patient. It is a natural law that every reaction is due to an action. So also the disease is caused by some exciting cause. If the cause is known it is very easy to find the correct remedy and cure the disease permanently. However it may not be easy to get the cause. In such cases also there are clues to get the cause. These are the symptoms present in the patient. The symptoms are nothing but the deviation or change from the normal sensations of the affected organ/s. If these changes are found through observation by physician, patient, relatives or from the sensations felt by the patient, these will give clue to find the correct remedy.

Only requirement is that the patient/relations have to give full details of the incident and the Homeopath has to get all the details. However for complete cure or maximum relief, a course of treatment may required depending on the complications involved. In long drawn cases, both the patient and the Homeopath have to maintain patience.

Is Homeopathy harmless and without side effect?


Homeopathy as such is not harmless or without side effect. In fact a thing which cannot harm cannot help also. It is a natural phenomena in every field. The harm and the side effects depends on the way the treatment is given. There are guidelines and methods to be followed in the treatment so that the effect is positive. if we take the case of Atom, we all know that it can be used either for prosperity by creating energy or destruction by exploding bombs. Electricity is another example where if it is misused/abused it will harm. If it used with the regulations it will ease the life and make the living comfortable. Homeopathy or for that matter any system of medicine is also like that.

What are the Patient's Information to Homeopathy Physician?

The patients or those seeking suggestion on behalf of patients may note the following points while explaining the problems of the patients:

Let the full details of the complaint be narrated - as far as possible by the patient.

Whether it will be possible to trace the possible cause of the present problem.

How did the problem start and since when it started.

Whether the complaint is better or worse during any particular time of the day or night?

Is the complaint better or worse by rest, movements, heat, cold, pressure, massage, biding the affected part or what does the patient do when the problem comes to get relief, before going for medicine?

Which seasons agrees or disagrees with the patient i e summer, winter, wet weather?

How is the appetite, whether any craving or aversion to any particular food item/s?

Approximately how much quantity of water the patient drinks a day? Whether it frequently small quantities or large quantities?

Any preference as to cold or warm drinks/food?

Whether constipated? Any urinary trouble?

Whether sleep is normal? Any dreams?

Past history of health problems - any past illness like malaria, influenza, typhoid, jaundice, diarrhea, dysentery, skin problems, B P, Diabetes, mumps, measles or other eruptions any accident - full details to be given.

Any common disease to parents like skin disease, allergy, arthritis, BP, Diabetes, TB, Pleurisy, cancer?

What is the temperament of the patient? Whether like or dislike company?

Any other information the patient may be aware of

In case of females: Whether menses regular, ( 28 to 30 days), any pain before, during after menses, is the flow normal, how many days the menses last any particular discomfort?

In many cases there will be some peculiar or strange things associated with the illness: examples:- pain in eye- patient may apply cold water or ice to the eye, loose motion as soon as getting up from bed in the morning, escape of stool with passing of flatus/gas, hot fomentation etc spontaneously without any body telling anything. Similarly the problem may recur at regular inter wells at the same time every week, every 10 days, 15 days, monthly or yearly. Problems come on one side and goes to other side, lying on painful side gives relief or lying on other side increases pain or discomfort, problems increase by eating or before eating etc. These are so innumerable to describe. The patient and those with them should observe any such thing and report the same to the attending/consultant physician as these will be valuable in getting the proper medicine.

What is Homeopathy and how Homeopathic System Works?

What is Homeopathy?

Homeopathy is a system of medical care for diseases based on the principle of like cure like or similar cures similar. The meaning is that one which can create a problem can also cure that problem. There are several substances in the nature which can be broadly classified as edible or poisonous. The edible when eaten gives us the energy. The other group gives us trouble if consumed. The uneasiness created by a particular item is curable by the same item if properly treated. This in nutshell is the principle of homeopathy. The actual spelling of the word is Homoeopathy which later changed into Homeopathy.  Homeopathy system was the original and only system of medicine from the beginning. In the Sanskrit literatures it is found in the expressions of 'Ushnam Ushnena Santhathe' (heat is cured by heat) or samam samena samathe (Similar is cured by similar). In the olden times the elders in the family will be knowing the medicines or measures to be taken whenever any member of the family become ill. But the knowledge was not recorded in any manner. It was passed on generation to generation by word of mouth. This gets corrupted over a period of time and looses its effectiveness. A brief detail about this is given in the page "A good System of Medicine". As explained therein, it was Hahnemann who by scientific experimentation on living human beings, repeatedly substantiated the law of Similar, and founded the principles, procedures and practice, method of preparation of medicines etc.

How the Homeopathic medicine works?

According to Hahnemann disease is primarily a disturbance in the life force or the guiding energy which regulates, governs and co-ordinates all organs and part of the body. In normal health this force maintains normal growth and co-ordinates all functions. When from some disease, this force is disturbed, disharmony of functions occurs. This disharmony of functions is called the disease, illness or sickness etc. The cause of the disturbance may be infections, injuries, exposures, weather changes, emotions, faulty diet habits etc. These disturbances produce symptoms. Symptoms are the signals of deviations of health from the normal conditions. For example, if menses fails, it may be a symptom of pregnancy. It can also happen due to old age, disease or fright. Blood spitting may be a sign of lungs trouble but need not always be of pulmonary trouble. All symptoms or signs are responses voluntary or involuntary or impulses registering in nerve centers. It is not always possible to pin point the exact problem from symptoms. Harvey Farrington, one of the pioneers in homeopathy said that "All that doctor can find out about his patient, by all the means at his command, is often insufficient to make a clear diagnosis." It is a fact that our best diagnosticians are incorrect in more than 50% of the cases. Even laboratory findings cannot always be relied upon. Correct logical reasoning must prevail on the part of the physicians.

Hahnemann was first to systematize symptoms and call attention to their importance in diagnosis and treatment.He proved that each drug produces its own peculiar and characteristic group of symptoms when administered to healthy persons. These are codified, recorded   and are the guiding symptoms which help the selection of homeopathic remedy.

Now when person is affected with disease, his life force or guiding energy (normally called as the immunity system or resistance power) tries to repel the cause of disease. Over a period of time, due to our life habits, the system gets weakened and the force is not in a position to repel the cause and the disease persists and advances. As seen earlier the disease produces deviations from normalcy which are expressed by the system in terms of symptoms. When medicine on the basis of the symptoms is selected and administered, a reaction takes place. The medicine produces an artificial disease in the patient similar to the one he is suffering from. So there are 2 similar diseases, one natural and the other artificially induced by the medicine. The strength of the medicine is selected such as to be stronger than the natural disease. As per the nature, no two identical force can co-exist. Hence a fight between these two forces takes place and the stronger one drives away the weaker one. Since the medicine is selected to be stronger than the natural one, this drives out the natural one. The artificial one produced by the medicine gets weekend as the medicine is discontinued. At this time the life force in us take control and drives out the induced disease.

History of medicine in relation to Homeopathy - A Good System of Medicine

Homeopathy is a system of medicine like Ayurveda, or the medications by the grannies of ester years, and Unani etc. These medications were on the basis of the experiments and experiences of people, gathered during generations. Though these systems were confirming to the natural principles, no scientifically written or other documents were made available by those who practiced medicines. The knowledge and experience were passed on from generation to the next generation by word of mouth or apprenticeship.

These systems in all over the world were using natural substances, mainly from plants, animals & minerals, to prepare medicines. The original systems of medicine were becoming difficult to practice, as there were no documents available for the posterity, to refer upon. Hence these systems had Gradual decline. In their place Allopathic system (the so called modern medical system) came up on the basis of experiments on dumb animals  like rats and pigs. Subsequently the Pharmaceutical companies monopolized the production of medicines and took over the experiments in the name of researches. Now the dominant medical system, including that of medical education is in the clutches of the multi-national pharmaceutical giants, who want the medical system to go only as per their dictates. Since this system, though gives relief, is having the problem of serious consequential side effects, many of the prominent practitioners were disillusioned with the system.

The basic principle of Homeopathy as a system of medicine was recognized in Greece by the physician, Hippocrates (460-350 B.C) (on whose name the allopaths take their oath) who is regarded as the Father of Medicine. In fact he is the actual founder of both the homeopathic and Allopathic system of medicine. He wrote: "By similar things a disease is produced and through the application of the like, it is cured". Hippocrates recognized the natural ability of the body to cure itself, and wrote that medical treatment is aimed at: "Removing the impediments to people getting better". He expressed the symptoms of a disease as the expression of nature's healing process going on in the system.

Next only to Hippocrates, was another Greek physician, Galen (130 - 200 AD. He wrote of natural cure by the likes. He was recognized as an authority in medicine for more than 1,000 years. However, there was not much progress made during this period. During the 15th century Dr Theophastus Von Bombast - a Swiss physician stated that sames must be cured by sames. He also believed that every diseased organ had its corresponding remedy in nature.

One of the persons, dissatisfied with Allopathic system, was Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann a German Allopathic Doctor of prominence of his time. Homeopathy system was founded by him. He was born on the 10th April, 1755. Hahnemann was dissatisfied with Allopathic system, as he was finding that the patients who after treatment are getting relief, have to come back for further treatment for the same illness with higher intensity or other consequent diseases. He left the practice of medicine and joined the Government service as a translator. He knew several languages. His assignment was to translate medical literature. This gave him an opportunity to know the practices prevalent in different countries, for the period for which medical literature was available. During the course, he came across the principle "Similia Similibus Curentur" i.e. like cure like'. He experimented the principle with Cinchona (the bark of a Peruvian tree) which was being used for malaria at that time. He found that by his taking this substance, he was getting symptoms similar to malaria fever. On stopping his taking the substance, the symptoms started disappearing. This was repeated several times and on all occasions the same phenomena was observed. Then he started experimenting with more and more such substances on himself and the healthy volunteers who were his followers. On the basis of the findings, he started publishing his theory on homeopathy.

However, any change in the established practice will not only accepted easily, and also there will will be all sorts of impediments put by those who are likely to be affected by the change. This is exactly what is happening to homeopathy also. I am sure that homeopathy being a very good scientific system of medicine, it will come to the fore front in the days to come.

homeo4health

This site is dedicated to Public Good Health. There is a say that "Health is Wealth". This is 100% correct. If our health is normal, we will be able to give better attention to what we are doing and we can achieve much better results in whatever we are doing.

But unfortunately, the attitude is not to take the health problems seriously. Instead we try to circumvent the problem by buying and popping up into our mouth, any of the patent medicines available without prescriptions. We all feel that we are doing something very important, that the health problem can be relegated to a future convenient time, which comes only when things go beyond a tolerable level. Till such time we go on with the unprescribed self medication which add to the gravity of the problem.

We are all having a wonderful system of resistance or immunity in us. The system, when weakened due to any or many reasons, calls for help by giving out signals like headache, fever, chill, itch, vomiting, pains or such other sensations. If in the beginning itself the health problem is attended by going to a physician of the scientific system of medicine i.e. Homeopathy much of the trouble, agony, suffering and expenses involved in treatment of serious health problems can be avoided.

Of course no system of medicine can claim every virtue of healing. All systems are having some plus points and deficiencies. Homeopathy healing has no short coming. Whatever shortcomings we experience are on the part of most of the homeopaths. Even with these shortcomings, homeopathy is next only to natural system of healing. In fact it is only an extension of natural healing. It is a system founded on scientific basis of healing.

This site is a humble attempt from my side to propagate homeopathy in my own small way. This is just a preliminary introduction of the subject. There are several very good sites on this subject for people of all level of interests. One such site is http://www.homeopathyhome.net, http://hpathy.com. These sites are having vast literature of all levels on Homeopathy. I am indebted to homeopathy for the relief I got on my migraine and arthritis. My wife is also having good relief from asthma problem. Hence I decided to build this site to propagate homeopathy.

Now a bit of introduction about myself. I am A R Ramanathan from Bangalore, the capital city of software and Biotech of India. I was working in the New India Assurance Co ltd a leading insurance company of India. I retired as Deputy Manager on 30.06.1999. I had hobbies like gardening, reading, making furniture for my home, painting of inside home, electric wiring of home, assembling of electronic gadgets like voltage stabilizers, radio, amplifiers and items which make different birds sounds and switches which operate on sounds or on light. From 1994 I started to study books on homeopathy system of treatment. I had done a certificate course from The Grace Medical Mission from an institute in Kerala a State of India. Subsequently I did a diploma course, D I Hom, from the British Institute of Homeopathy, London.

I request you to go through my web pages and give me your critical views and comments for further improvements.