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Jose Miguel
Mullen, MD, MD (H), MFHom. |
| HOMEOPATHIC
NEWSLETTER |
number twelve
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THE PRINCIPLE OF ACTION AND REACTION |
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In issue # 11 of this newsletter I mentioned that three
pillars sustain Homeopathy. The first is the Vital Force, that I described in
that issue, the second is the law of similars, that I described in Dr.
Hahnemann and the Homeopathic principle of ‘Like cures like’ , in issue # 9,
and in Simillimums and similars, in issue # 5.
Now is the turn of describing the third pillar, the
principle of action and reaction.
The principle of action and reaction, first described
by Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727), states that to every action there is an equal
and opposite reaction.
This principle is a matter of everyday experiences in
essentially every field of endeavor which includes Medicine, both in its
Allopathic and Homeopathic varieties.
In Allopathy, the action is triggered by the
administration of a treatment designed to combat some particular malady, and
the reaction is characterized by the inevitable return, in time, of that
malady.
In Homeopathy, the action is triggered by the induction
of an artificial disease, and the reaction is characterized by the dawn of
health.
In Allopathy, then, the reaction is as welcome as a
skunk in a garden party. In Homeopathy, instead, the reaction is something we
always look for and we always attempt to trigger; the sweet harbinger of
therapeutic success.
Let me illustrate the Allopathic action and reaction to
treatment with two examples, decongestants and laxatives.
Most decongestants have been designed with the laudable
purpose of shrinking swollen nasal passages and therefore of allowing patients
to breathe freely. At first, their effect is wonderful. Almost immediately
after sniffing a decongestant, patients feel as if they had all of a sudden
developed four noses through which to breathe, a marvelous relief that lasts
for some time. After more use, though, congestion re-appears as soon as
patients stop using the decongestant and, after still further utilization,
congestion remains—and worsens—even as the patient is using it.
Another instance of action and reaction worthy of
mention here is the one that happens with the administration of most laxatives.
At first results are miraculous, though perhaps a bit messy, alas! But soon
enough constipation inevitably reasserts itself with a vengeance, often
accompanied by abdominal discomfort, cramps, inflammation and malaise.
In Allopathy, then, and if I may be allowed to repeat
myself, Doctors engage in an action designed to eliminate a disease, to which
the patient’s organism reacts by often reinstating the very disease the
Allopathic treatment attempts to eliminate.
What Homeopaths seek, instead, is not the elimination
of an ailment but rather the induction of an artificial disease in the patient.
Allow me now to define what Homeopathy considers a
natural and what an artificial disease are.
A natural disease is an illness that actually afflicts the patient,
the reason why he or she goes to the Doctor in the first place. The Vital
Force, that reigns supreme when a person is healthy, meekly allows natural
diseases to shove it aside, take its place and weaken the patient’s organs and
tissues.
An artificial disease, on the other hand, is induced by the
administration of a Homeopathic remedy.
When we want to assess a remedy’s range of usefulness,
we prepare it Homeopathically and then administer it to healthy male and female
Human volunteers every single day and at the same power or dosis. This form of
administration, that we call Provings, provokes an artificial disease in the volunteers after
several days, a disease that has a profile or set of symptoms that is unique
and characteristic for every remedy so studied.
When a disease-bearing patient comes to us, first we
study him or her, and then we administer the remedy that has developed in
Provings the same profile the patient has, according to the Law of Similars.
When a patient is successfully treated Homeopathically,
the artificial disease induced by the administration of the correct Homeopathic
remedy expels the patient’s natural disease and replaces it. This happens
because the artificial disease induced by the Homeopathic remedy is vastly more
powerful than the natural one originally afflicting the patient.
Contrasting with the meekness it displays when pushed
aside by a natural disease, the Vital Force reacts to the artificial diseases
like a Miura bull reacts at the sight of the red capote of a torero in a Plaza
de Toros. The hapless artificial disease is no match for the charging Vital
Force. It is promptly blown to Kingdom come. The ultimate result is that no
disease remains, neither natural nor artificial, the Vital Force regains its
grip everywhere and consequently health is restored.
Now, why a Vital Force so easily intimidated by a
natural disease becomes so emboldened when faced with the much stronger
artificial disease, is one of the mysteries of Homeopathy.
At any rate, this sequence of events, like so many
other wonderful and imaginative things, is the brainchild of the founder of
Homeopathy, Dr. Samuel Hahnemann.
Dr. Hahnemann noticed, as every Physician did since the
beginning of times, that whenever he assisted a patient by means of attempting
to destroy a disease with a successful treatment, his patient would almost
invariably be whacked back into the very same illness he was attempting to
eliminate.
Why, then, not to induce an artificial disease and then
let the patient’s organism bring about the restitution of health as a reaction?
But he had to be mighty careful with the artificial
disease he wanted to elicit for, if it was strong enough, it might smother the
reaction altogether. This was the conundrum he had to deal with for years to
come.
Enter Drs. Rudolf Arndt (1835-1900), a German
Psychiatrist, and Hugo Schultz (1853-1932), a German Pharmacologist. They both
promulgated a law that says “Minimal doses stimulate, medium doses
inhibit and large doses destroy”.
According to this law, the
action of a minimal dose stimulates a reaction, that of a medium dose inhibits
the reaction and that a large enough dose destroys it. Or, in Homeopathic
parlance, a very mild artificial disease summons the Vital Force, a more severe
disease inhibits that call and a very severe one muffles it completely.
So now Dr. Hahnemann’s had to
learn how to produce artificial diseases, and mild ones at that.
At this point, his famous British contemporary, a
Physician called William Cullen came unwittingly to his aid. The means how he helped Dr.
Hahnemann was through his voluminous Medical textbook entitled
“Lectures of Materia Medica”. In this
opus magnus Dr.
Cullen described, amongst many other things, the action of the bark of the
Latin-American china tree on intermittent fevers, which we now call malaria or
paludism. The bark was causing a tremendous stir in Europe, where paludism was
then rampant and incurable. In his book, Dr. Cullen stated that the bark was
useful because it strengthened the wall of the stomach. Dr. Cullen thought that
the intermittent fevers were caused by weakness in the wall of the stomach and
that the china bark, being so bitter, acted by means of strengthening it.
Dr. Hahnemann laid hands on this book because he wanted
to translate it into German. At that stage of his life, and being polyglot, he
earned his keep by means of translating foreign books into German. And he chose
to translate instead of practicing his art because he adamantly refused to
torture patients through the application of the atrocious Medicine then in
vogue.
The concept that the bark
strengthened the stomach wall didn’t sit well with Dr. Hahnemann, though. If
fact, he considered it to be totally absurd. So he decided to prove its
absurdity by trying the extract of the china bark on himself.
So he started to take the bark
and, to his utter and absolute shock and amazement, he noticed that the
ingestion of the bark extract produced the same symptoms, that is, an
artificial disease that was similar to that produced by the intermittent
fevers!
So now he finally had the
clue of how to produce an artificial disease. But he had also painfully learnt
that this artificial disease had a powerful kick to it, for it took him some
time to recover from the hangover he got after he stopped using the bark. So he
decided to find out how to make this artificial disease gentler.
At the same time, he started to systematically explore
and test other substances to see if he could produce artificial diseases with
them, and discovered that each substance produced an artificial disease with
characteristics that were unique to it.
These were years of intense and frustrating
experimentation, but Dr. Hahnemann didn’t give up. He was nothing if he was not
a bulldog when he was after something that interested him.
He started by diluting the extracts in order to make
the artificial diseases milder. This, surely enough, made those substances
mellower, but dilution also weakened their capacity to produce artificial
diseases so that, by the time he had diluted them sufficiently, the substances
had lost both their capacity to produce bad reactions but also artificial
diseases.
Until the day when, after Heaven
knows how many failed trials and experiments, he discovered succussion.
To succuss is a very simple matter.
It is done by means of serially diluting and shaking,
if the substance is soluble in water and/or ethyl alcohol. Or else, if the
substance is insoluble in water and/or alcohol, by thoroughly mixing it with
dry lactose powder and triturating it in a ceramic mortar with the aid of a
pestle.
Once succussed at any given
substance, its capacity of inducing a mild artificial disease becomes fully
manifest, but its potential of eliciting any bad effect wanes into virtual
disappearance.
How Dr. Hahnemann came upon the
momentous, yet so simple discovery of succussion is not known.
Could it have been a dream? It
is known that, for some renowned inventors and empiricists, the answer to what
they were seeking came in a dream, after many failed experiments. The German
Dr. Friedrich Kekule (1829-1896), for example, after a lot of frustrating work
attempting to figure out the structure of the molecule of benzene, dreamt one
night of six whirling ballerinas, each stationed in one of the vertexes of a
hexagon. Or take the American Elias Howe (1819-1867), who invented of
the tip eyed needle-sewing machine. After a lot of long and frustrating work
attempting to device a useful needle, one night he had a nightmare in which he
saw himself surrounded by savages, each aiming a spear at him—
all of which spears had a hole near the tip!
Another explanation of how he
discovered succussion might be related with the abominable state of the roads
in his day, and the inevitable strong shaking of the solutions he carried when
going to visit his patients. Dr. Hahnemann, always the keenest of observers,
must have become puzzled at how much more powerful his solutions were after a
home visit than when he dispensed them in his office.
How succussion works still remains shrouded in mystery,
three Centuries after Dr. Hahnemann’s discovery. It has been experimentally
proven beyond doubt that succussion alters some physical characteristics of
water. Whatever else we know about what happens when succussing still remains
in the realm of speculation.
And so, after a lot of work carried out mostly single-handed, Dr. Hahnemann created
Homeopathy through triggering the correct action-reaction cascade by means of
administering each individual patient the succussed remedy that matches his or
her profile and thus creating in that patient a mild artificial disease at
will. A mild artificial disease that eliminates the natural disease originally
afflicting the patient, and that is in turn eliminated by the charge of the
patient’s Vital Force.
And finally, once the successful
Homeopathic treatment is completed and the Vital Force becomes enthroned,
balance and harmony gently permeates into the Whole patient and makes him or
her balanced and hale.
Like we
say in Spanish se dice rápido it is
said fast, but how mind-boggling it is to describe, even if briefly, the life
work of this most extraordinary man!
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THE HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF ACUTE
MENINGITIS |
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Meningitis is a disease manifested by inflammation of
the meninges, being the meninges the membranes that surround the nervous system
we have inside our skulls and along our spines.
This inflammation can be brought about by no apparent
reason or else, more frequently, by invasion of bacteria, parasites or viruses.
There are some rare forms that are self-limiting, but
many may progress into full-fledged meningitis. The disease can be contagious
by body fluids. It tends to attack mainly children and adolescents.
As far as I know there is a vaccine against meningitis,
but its action is limited to only a few strains of
Neisseria meningitidis.
In several instances, meningitis starts with
septicemia, that is, by the spilling of bacteria into the blood stream.
A terrible complication may rapidly kill patients
during this stage. It is called Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome. It is said
that up to 10 % of patients in the septicemic stage may fall victim of this
syndrome. Here bacteria, already in the bloodstream, settle into and destroy
the vital adrenal glands. The adrenals are bits of tissue that sit like little
battered hats atop each one of the kidneys. Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome is
a particularly vicious manifestation of meningitis, because it kills most of
the children it attacks. Patients with Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome differ
from other children with early meningitis because of the appearance of ominous
dark spots under the skin, caused by hemorrhages. Many untreated patients die
minutes after the appearance of the dark spots under the skin.
Bacteria become localized in the meninges once the
septicemic stage is over. Here acute meningitis can also kill, or else leave
patients with serious neurological problems that may continue afflicting them
for the rest of their lives.
In both the septicemic and the meningeal stages, the
key work is FAST. FAST diagnosis and FAST treatments, the faster the better.
A rapid clinical diagnosis may be difficult to make
during the septicemic stage of the disease. Here all the Doctor sees is a
collapsed patient, often unconscious and perhaps delirious, agitated or
languid, with a very high or a low-grade fever, with maybe mild or severe
stiffness in the neck, perhaps violent vomiting and precious little more on
which to base a correct clinical diagnosis in time. Here, as everywhere else in
Medicine, textbook diagnoses are generally found only in books.
During the Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome speed is
absolutely of the essence, because children can die minutes after the spots
appear in the skin.
Later on, when bacteria finally lodge in the meninges,
clinical diagnosis becomes easier, for by then the patient usually develops a
crop of very characteristic infectious and neurological symptoms.
Like it often happens in Medicine, once the clinical
diagnosis is ascertained or suspected, lab work confirms it.
In acute meningitis, the Doctor must start treatment
with every means at his or her reach, be it Allopathic or Homeopathic, as soon as diagnosis is made or even
suspected.
Remember that this is an
acute disease.
And furthermore that, in acute diseases, patients may
change their Homeopathic profile at the drop of a hat. Change of Homeopathic
profile means that the remedy the patient was receiving will not work any more,
and that a new one will be needed at once.
This is why, in acute Homeopathic treatments, the acute
patient must be under constant observation by an experienced Homeopathic Physician, capable
of rapidly recognizing the need of each remedy and of immediately changing it
as needed.
It is also advisable to use high potencies.
I would recommend potencies of 1 M or higher repeated
every few minutes, regardless of the stage. Or else high LM potencies.
HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF THE SEPTICEMIC STAGE
Echinacea
angustifolia is useful for all kinds of septic fevers and
septicemias. The patient is exhausted and in pain. There is headache with
flushing of the face, sometimes all the way down to the neck. Chills are felt
as waves of icy cold that go up the spine. Chills are accompanied by nausea.
There can be sweating in the upper part of the body.
Pyrogen Here
fever begins suddenly with pain in the extremities. Chills start between
scapulæ and rapidly become generalized. The patient doesn’t want to be
uncovered. The patient must move to relieve the intense bruise-like pain he or
she feels in the body parts that lie on the bed that is felt as being very
hard. The patient rapidly produces bedsores. Perspiration, breath, secretions
and excretions may have an intense putrid odor. The tongue can be red and
bright, as if varnished. The patient vomits cold water immediately after
swallowing it, but tolerates well hot drinks. Sweats tend to be cold, do not
improve and are frequently malodorous. There is great loquacity, worse during
fever.
Useful when the best-selected remedy fails.
Remember the keynote of this remedy, fast pulse and low
to moderate body temperature, though this keynote is often found in very
advanced stages of the disease.
Sepsin can be used if the patient presents
Pyrogen symptoms and also diarrhea.
Stramonium is useful for patients with very high fever and complete
absence of pain. Patients can have delirium, which may be furious. Delirium may
appear or worsen in the dark or by seeing bright objects or surfaces. Patients
may insult and curse. There can be opistotonus (arching backwards of the
spine). There are convulsions and spasms, frequently triggered by a bright
light or by approaching a glass of water to the patient’s lips. There is no
thirst during fever but the patient is thirsty during sweats. Sweat is intense
and cold. The patient demands company and cannot be left in the dark.
Sulphur is useful in Bryonia
patients, because Bryonia is a very
slow acting remedy and here we have to act as fast as possible. (Bryonia
patients are very irritable, obsessed with money and want to be left alone and
quiet, preferably in the dark, and facing the wall if there is someone else in
the room. They worsen markedly by movement. All mucous membranes are dry. There
is easy, profuse perspiration. Chills start in tip of fingers and toes, and in
lips. Thirst for large draughts of cold drinks can be extreme, particularly
during fever.
HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF WATERHOUSE-FRIDERICHSEN SYNDROME
Arnica montana The patient is very
irritable and restless, complaints that the bed is hard. Fears the approach of
others and being touched. The patient can be lethargic, and from lethargy he or
she may slide into unconsciousness. The patient may answer questions rapidly to
immediately afterward ask to be left alone and slide back into lethargy or
unconsciousness. The head and upper part of the body can be very hot and the
rest of the patient’s body cold. Hemorrhages under the skin have the appearance
of bruises and hurt like bruises. Eructations and flatus may smell like rotten
eggs.
Crotalus horridus. The patient is
excited and delirious, wants to jump off the bed. His or her mind and memory
are dazed. There may be headache, which can be severe. There can be bloody
vomiting and diarrhea. Blood decomposes rapidly There is much hemorrhage under
the skin in the form of purpura (small collections of blood under the skin of
up to 1 cm. in diameter). The back may be stiff. Jaundice, consequence of
rupture of red blood cells under the skin, is a must when considering the use
of this remedy.
Lachesis muta There is profound
prostration. There can be headache with unconsciousness and/or with vomiting.
Headache can be very severe. There can be opisthotonos (the spine stiffens and
curves backwards), The patient talks all the time, jumps from one subject to
another and does not tolerate tight clothes anywhere. The hemorrhages under the
skin are bluish and mottled. There can be ecchymoses (small collections of
blood under the skin larger than purpuras) There are hot flashes and hot
perspiration. Fever can be very high and weakening.
HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF CHILDREN WITH ACUTE MENINGITIS.
Apis mellifica is very useful in
patients with swelling of the meninges. Symptoms tend to appear suddenly and
violently. The child has extremely high fever and opisthotonos. The patient may
have seizures. There is cri éncephalique
(a very high pitched, eerie, chilling, loud cry impossible to describe. If you
have heard it once it will haunt you forever after). The child may cry before
seizures and also during sleep or lethargy. The patient murmurs during
delirium. The patient sinks head on pillow and moves it from side to side. The
child is pale as wax and thirstless. There is spasm of the flexor muscles and
positive Babinski reflex (toes extend and fan out when the sole is tickled from
heels to toes). The little patient can be lethargic. The patient is very hot
with fever and wants to uncover.
Belladonna According to Prof. Dr.
Ignacio Vijnovsky, Belladonna is
probably the best remedy for acute meningitis. The face is very red. The pupils
are dilated and do not react to light.The mouth is dry and the papillæ of the
tongue stand up. The patient is either very thirsty or not thirsty at all.
There is projectile vomiting. Symptoms start and end suddenly. The head rolls
on the pillow. There is delirium that can be furious with visual
hallucinations. At the time of delirium the patient can become incredibly
strong. The patient may want to get up and run away. There may be seizures.
There is desire for lemonade. The fever is very high, and has the following
striking characteristic: when one retrieves the hand from the patient’s
forehead, the heat remains on the hand for a relatively long while, as if it
had been transferred there from the patient’s forehead.
Belladonna is particularly indicated in acute meningitis brought about
by vaccinations.
Helleborus niger The patient is slow
to react, indifferent. There are automatic movements of one arm and one foot or
paralysis more or less complete. The patient may slide down in bed.
Cri éncephalique. There can be seizures with the body cold and the head
hot. There is extreme weakness. The patient constantly rolls his or her head
from side to side and sinks it in the pillow. Eyes wide open during stupor with
pupils dilated. Eyes can be drawn upwards. Vacant stare. Symptoms are worse
between 4:00 and 8:00 PM or from evening till morning. There can be automatic
movements of one arm and one leg. The patient brings hands to head. Chills
mainly during daytime, start in arms. The patient is thirstless during chills.
Sulphur is useful in tuberculous
meningitis, especially in early stages if the patient has violent seizures and
sudden flushing in the face and pupils are dilated. The child can’t hold the
head up because of weakness of cervical muscles. The patient wants to lie with
head low, cries out during sleep as if frightened and flails out both legs when
falling asleep. Child wants to lie with head low, cries out in sleep as if
frightened. Face is red and pupils are dilated. In meningitis consequence of
suppression of eruptions is followed well by Apis and it also follows Apis
well.
HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT OF THE MENINGEAL STAGE OF ACUTE MENINGITIS
Agaricus muscaricus has spasms of the
eyes and the eyelids, violent and rapid rolling of the head and increased
bodily mobility with twitching of the muscles. Intelligence is diminished
almost to the point of imbecility.
Apis mellifica please see above in
“Homeopathic treatment of children with acute meningitis”. One of the best
remedies for acute meningitis with effusion of liquid in the brain. Indicated
in the treatment for acute meningitis post-vaccination. The patient rolls head
side to side on pillow, grinds teeth, and is semiconscious and silent. Silence
is only perturbed by an occasional sharp cry. Symptoms are very acute.
Arnica Montana see above in
“Homeopathic treatment of Waterhouse-Friderichsen syndrome”. Indicated in
posttraumatic acute meningitis with great somnolence and partial paralysis of
the tongue, eye muscles, iris and extremities.
Arsenicum album can be used in
patients who also have hydrocephalus if the skin is hot, the face pale and hot,
there is lethargy with spasms or the patient is like dead. Eyes are half closed
without reflexes. There is constant thirst for small sips of drinks preferably
hot.
Belladonna please see above
“Homeopathic treatment of children with acute meningitis”. The patient rolls
head from side to side, sink head in pillow, grind teeth, brings hands to head,
rolls head from side to side, is semiconscious and silent. Silence is only
broken by an occasional sharp cry. There can be projectile vomiting.
Bryonia alba if meningitis is
consequence of suppression of exanthemas (skin rashes). The patient is
lethargic. Constant chewing movements. Face dark red. Lips so dry that they
appears as if broiled. There is thirst of large gulps. The patient will yell if
moved. Helleborus follows well if the
patient becomes semiconscious. If the patient yells,
Bryonia can be followed by Apis
Cantharis has furious delirium with
priapism (persistent abnormal erection of the penis). The patient howls
frightfully like a dog and then is seized by spasms. Eyes roll in sockets.
There is constriction of the throat, worse by the sight of water. Attacks are
triggered by pressure or touch. Or the patient may be collapsed with sunken
features and distressed face. There may be coldness. Or else the patient lies
unconscious with arms stretched along the sides, having sudden starts with
screaming and throwing about of arms. There may be squeezing and contraction of
the front of the chest with impeded respiration. The patient also may present
this remedy’s characteristic urinary symptoms (very painful and distressing
urination, weak stream, dark and bloody urine).
Cicuta virosa specific for violent
seizures in opisthotonos (patient curved backwards) caused by acute meningitis.
Cuprum metallicum is excellent in
patients with spasms. Useful for meningitis consequence of suppressed skin
eruptions or scarlet fever, measles or erysipelas. The delirium is similar of
Belladonna’s. When awake, the patient looks frightened. The patient may
scream. Seizures with pale features and clenched thumbs, bluish lips and
rolling eyes.
Digitalis purpurea The patient has
throbbing frontal headache. The vision is colored green and yellow. The pulse
is very slow and weak. There is cri
éncephalique. There is mental confusion and edema of the eye grounds.
There may be a bluish decoloration of the skin.
Don’t administer Cinchona after digitalis!
Glonoinum
has opisthotonos, his or her face is very hot, red and bright. Eyes are
glassy and bright. The head and upper half of the trunk are hot, inferior half
and extremities can be cold and covered with sweat. There are seizures and
screams triggered by attempts to move the patient. Cold applications relieve
head, warm applications relieve extremities. A hot room triggers seizures.
There is difficult breathing. Heart palpitations can be heard some distance
away. There is stupefaction.
Helleborus niger please see above
“Homeopathic treatment of children with acute meningitis”
Hyosciamus niger has fever with
delirium, hot head and fixed stare. There are prominent carotid palpitations.
Seizures start in face and are followed by unconsciousness and paralysis. There
may be delirium with desire to run away. The patient may constantly pick at
bedclothes and exhibit his or her genitalia.
Ipeca There is opistotonus.
Constant and violent nausea with constant and violent bilious vomiting. The
tongue is clean and not coated. Lethargy after vomiting. Sometimes labored
breathing during fever. One hand may be hot, the other hand cold. Convulsive
shaking of legs and feet. No thirst during fever.
Natrum muriaticum has extreme thirst
for cold drinks that increases with fever. The mucous membranes are dry. The
patient pulls his or her head backwards and then jerks it forward.
Natrum sulphuricum The patient pushes
his or her head backwards and may shake the head towards the right. There are
opisthotonos, mental irritability and delirium. Terrible headache in back of
head and neck that the patient describes as a dog biting. The patient is
markedly worse in damp weather.
Opium the patient is profoundly
unconscious and unresponsive, or may respond to questions and then rapidly
become unconscious again. Breathing is loud and stertorous. Eyes are half open,
sometimes pointing outwards, pupils are pinpoint and unresponsive. There is no
pain. The patient may be delirious. The skin is red and may be mottled. The
perspiration is warm or hot. Lower limbs may not perspire. There is
opisthotonos. Seizures may be triggered by opisthotonos. If mother gives a hot
bath to child to calm seizures the child becomes immediately unconscious, as if
dead (In Apis a hot bath produces relief).
Physostigma is useful when the
muscles are rigid, as if with tetanus. There is trismus (the jaw is clinched
shut). The patient cannot open his or her eyes.
Rhus tox is similar to
Apis. Its use is recommended when Apis
is used without benefit in patients who displays symptoms of
Apis.
Solanum nigrum has severe
convulsions. During the convulsion, the patient extends arms outwards as hands
become obstetrician’s or accoucheur’s
hands (the hand is flexed at the wrist, with the fingers flexed at the base but
extended at the interphalangeal joints as the thumb flexes strongly into the
hand). Then the patient brings hands to the mouth and makes motions of chewing
and swallowing. Afterwards the patient lies on his or her back completely
exhausted. There is furious delirium. There may be tetanic contractions in the
whole body and terrible headache.
Stramonium has violent restlessness
and delirium that can be maniacal and violent and triggered by bright lights.
The patient is agitated and ceaselessly talking. There is no pain. As the
disease progresses the patient may fall into unconsciousness, he or she may
develop cold sweats and the fever may abate. The patient must have light and
company. Indicated in meningitis after suppressed otitis media. There is
expression of great suffering. There is opisthotonos and convulsions of every
muscle of the body.
Tarentula hispanica is very similar
to Agaricus muscaricus. The
difference is that the patient finds some relief when vigorously rubbing the
head against the pillow.
Zincum metallicum is indicated in
meningitis brought about by suppressed skin eruptions or when the patient has
been so weak that he has been unable to develop one (like in measles, etc.).
The patient is lethargic, stupefied. There is marked restlessness of legs.
There may be a cramp in the root of the nose. The patient is worse with wine.
(Information obtained from the
writings of Drs. Hahnemann, Allen, Bailey, Boericke, Candegabe, Nash,
Farrington and Vijnovsky, from notes obtained in class when I was studying in
the Escuela de Post-Grado de la Asociación Médica Homeopática Argentina and
from my own experience).
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Profiles of Homeopathic remedies
Arnica montana |
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Arnica
montana is
arguably one of the best known and most frequently used remedy in mother
tincture, cream or Homeopathic remedy.
It grows in the mountains, that is, in areas where people
are bound to slip and fall and hurt themselves—thus its most common use.
In Homeopathy we always insist that any particular remedy
must match the profile of the Whole patient to whom it is administered in order
to be effective. Well, this axiom does not necessarily apply to Arnica. No matter what the profile of an
injured patient may be, Arnica is likely to be of assistance as long as the
patient is hurt. Don’t use it for open wounds, though. We have other remedies
for that.
In superficial closed injuries, Arnica can be applied locally, as mother tincture or cream. It can
also be administered by mouth in the treatment of this kind of traumatisms, and
also if the trauma is internal, as it happens in concussions and the like.
Arnica is useful when the areas that
are hurt feel as if they were bruised, as well as in thromboses, local or
generalized consequences of traumatisms and also whenever there is loss of blood
from natural orifices. It is also associated with surgery, in itself a
traumatism.
In most of the above scenarios, Arnica will help the patient.
But Arnica is also
a very important constitutional remedy, aside from its undeniable usefulness in
the treatment of traumatisms.
In Arnica patient the dominating feature is that of
grouchiness. The Arnica patient is a
world-class grouch. He or she doesn’t like to be approached, or talk to or—God
forbid—be touched! Oh, and try to avoid ask him or her questions, either. Arnica hates answering them.
So Arnica is also
a loner because he or she dislikes and fears that others may approach or touch
him or her.
Another characteristic of Arnica is that pain characteristically feels as if bruised.
When ill, Arnica will
complain that the bed is hard, no matter how comfortable it may actually be.
Not only that. He or she will be constantly moving and rolling about,
attempting to find a comfortable spot while constantly grumbling and referring
to the bed’s manufacturer ancestry in far from complementary terms.
And, when asked how he or she feels, Arnica will impatiently utter that he or she is well, no matter how
bad he or she may be feeling. And, if the Doctor or visitor becomes too
solicitous, Arnica will suddenly spring
out of bed in a rage, shouting that he or she is well, bellowing that how can
the Doctor/visitor be so stupid as not to notice such an obvious fact and, if
sufficiently provoked, Arnica may
grab the Doctor/visitor by the cuff of the neck, drag him or her to the door,
shove him or her out, slam the door and then go back to bed uttering curses and
obscenities (this, of course, in the halcyon days when Doctors and the like
paid house visits. Nowadays, in Hospitals and the like, you can expect Arnica to be better behaved, although
his or her characteristic grouchiness will still be there in plain view for
everybody to see).
And, if ill enough to be stuporous or unconscious, Arnica will answer questions coherently,
to immediately afterwards slide back to his or her insensibility.
All of Arnica’s problems
tend to have a sudden onset.
Arnica patients tends to forget words
as they talk, a fact that doesn’t make them more gregarious—all the more when
added to their characteristic grouchiness.
Arnica is probably the fist remedy to
have in mind for traumatisms of the head, be they recent or remote. Also for
concussions, fractures and in every instance when one suspects the presence of
bleeding inside of the head or the brain.
In Arnica patients,
the head and face are warm, but the nose and the rest of the body tend to be
cold.
Again, Arnica is
useful in blows to the eyes. It hastens the absorption of retinal hemorrhages.
Tears can be burning. Pupils can be narrowed and not react to light.
This remedy is useful for hemorrhages in the ears and in
deafness due to blows. Think of Arnica when
ears hurt as if they had been hit.
Breath and feces have the odor of rotten eggs. This is
another characteristic of Arnica.
Think of Arnica when
you have a patient with urinary problems that appear after a traumatism or
after surgery.
Arnica is useful to prevent
miscarriages after traumas or falls. It is also useful in post-partum pain in
genitalia, provided that pain is felt as bruised. In menopause, think of Arnica when the patient is weak,
complaints of bruise-like pain, and develops bruises after the slightest touch.
In whooping cough, if the child cries before and after the
access of cough. Arnica is also
useful in post-traumatic cough and in violent cough associated with facial
herpes.
Think of Arnica in
rheumatic patients who fear being touched or hit by people around them.
Arnica is also useful in fever after a
traumatism, particularly if chills are felt in the epigastrium and if there is
bruised-like pain.
To sum up, Arnica is
very valuable for the treatment of traumatisms when administered locally and
systemically, and of traumatism-induced loss of blood by the nose and other
body orifices when administered systemically.
Arnica patients, in turn, are grouchy,
hate to be approached and touched, smell of rotten eggs and their pains have a
bruised-like characteristic all over.
Please, keep this remedy away from children Arnica at potencies below 12 C or their
equivalent at decimal and LM potencies.
(Information obtained from the Materia Medica of Drs.
Boericke, Kent, Farrington and Vijnovsky and from my own experience).
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Now is the turn of MRSA ... |
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…that is, of methicyllin-resistant
staphylococcus aureus, a bacterial strain resistant to most antibiotics and
that has already killed several people, many of whom unfortunately were
children.
As some time back it was the turn of a very resistant strain
of the bacilli that causes tuberculosis, a.k.a Koch bacillus. I’m sure you remember, that architect or engineer
who went to Europe and came back by plane, caused an uproar and finally had
part of one lung removed.
Let’s see now how long it takes for another super bug to
appear—because the fact of the matter is that more and more pathogenic
microorganisms are consistently becoming resistant to antibiotics.
It is very difficult to imagine nowadays the mantle of
euphoria that covered the land at the end of the Second World War.
There was elation because of the end of that nightmare and
because of the just triumph. There were jobs. There was money. Anyone who so
wished could go to College. Everybody could build his or her own house,
purchase a car and start a family.
And probably cresting it all was the collective illusion
that finally we had nothing more to fear regarding our health. Mostly
responsible for this feeling of relief was a new drug called Penicillin,
apparently capable of killing all the dreaded bacteria. A drug that came from a
humble mold called Penicillum notatum.
A wonder drug that
started the antibiotic era.
At about that time, a certain Paul de Kruif wrote a book
entitled “The microbe hunters”. In this book all microorganisms, if I recall
properly, were depicted as the bad guys, and all the researchers who found the
means of destroying them were depicted as knights in shining armor.
In that book, Researchers’ words were twisted into meaning
that all microorganisms are evil, pretty much as Darwin’s words have also been
twisted into meaning that mankind descends from monkeys.
“The microbe hunters” probably became a best seller because
it was a hymn of triumph over eons of helplessness. Finally, it seemed to say,
we Humans can rid ourselves of the threat of microorganisms thanks to
penicillin and other miracle drugs that were still awaiting in the wings. For millennia
we had been at the mercy of bugs that caused untold pain and grief. Hosanna and
thanks forever to the heroic microbe killers!
Misery, hunger, filth, despair, warfare, all those real and
present causes of manifold diseases and untimely death were conveniently swept
under the rug. It was much easier to put a face in all that suffering, to kill
microorganisms and thus enter instantly into a new, rosy and disease-free
world! Much less effort and a convenient outlet for pent-up frustration and
aggravation after all that impotent suffering.
Now we would be well forever!
And then the gods laughed.
Because bacteria would become resistant to those drugs.
Because even though there are immense quantities of mold strains, the number of
those strains is finite, and so is the number of antibiotics each strain
produces. And because not all the antibiotics they produce would be apt for
Human consumption.
By the 1950’s, many strains of microorganisms had become
resistant to the early antibiotics.
Also, these drugs had started to mess up the delicate
balance of our indigenous bacterial flora by indiscriminately destroying
beneficial microorganisms together with the pathogenic ones. The damage brought
about by this abuse is only now starting to be assessed in all its appalling
magnitude.
By the mid to late 1950’s the streptomycins, utterly
stunning and miraculous breakthrough drugs against the dreaded tuberculosis,
a.k.a the captains of the legions of death, were leaving hosts of patients deaf
and with uncontrollable and irreversible vertigo. What’s more, soon tubercular
bacilli not only became immune to these drugs, but dependent on them. When in
culture, they would die if not fed streptomycins on a regular basis!
In those days also
debuted Chloromycetin or chloramphenicol, an absolutely extraordinary
breakthrough miracle drug against typhoid fever. Pity it would also wipe out
the vital blood cell-producing bone marrow.
By the onset of the 1960’s people were starting to become
genuinely concerned. What if this golden promise was, after all, nothing but a
mirage, something too good to be true, only a mad race between newly discovered
antibiotics and strains of microorganisms that had been made resistant to all
the previous ones? And for how long would this race last? A certain fatalism
was starting to percolate into the Medical profession about who would
ultimately win—a fatalism that has become more and more prominent as time went
by.
Some bacteria, like the syphilitic treponema pallidum and
some strains of streptococci, have remained sensitive to antibiotics, but there
are only a few.
Bacteria and molds are supposed to have been the first
inhabitants of the world. Ever since, they happily started to grow and
reproduce and to populate the Earth. Eventually, though, space started to
become tight. Colonies of bacteria and colonies of molds began to clash with
and to overlap each other. It wasn’t a nice or a peaceful encounter. It was a
case of hatred at first touch. Right then and everywhere they started a war for
turf. A war to the death. Molds started to secrete biological weapons that
killed bacteria and bacteria, in turn, learnt to produce substances that
neutralized the deadly stuff produced by molds. Whenever molds’ biological
weapon killed bacteria, the former would joyfully start to occupy the space
left vacant by the defunct bacteria, and whenever bacteria neutralized the
molds’ biological weapons they would occupy and suffocate their enemies. They
have been at it ever since. Finally they were both forced to achieve some sort
of entente anything but cordial
after colossal losses on both sides. Only the molds best adapted to producing
bacteria-killing juices and the bacteria best adapted to neutralize those
deadly substances survived.
Eventually the famed microbe hunters discovered antibiotics,
that is, precisely the biological weapons molds have been secreting since the
beginning of time to kill bacteria. The only difference between the
anti-bacterial biological weapons molds secrete au naturel and antibiotics is that the latter are more
concentrated, often chemically modified and that they are served to bacteria in
much larger quantities and more purified form. Of course, the results are
calamitously lethal for bacteria at first, but eventually survivors begin to
work their eons-old tricks, recover and start producing the stuff that makes
them resistant to the pesky new biological weapon threatening their survival.
Some bacterial strains have greater survival potential than others—not
necessarily the most beneficial ones to us, mind you—which is the main reason
for the total imbalance that remains amongst the diverse strains of bacteria
that populate us after each devastating antibiotic treatment.
Also, many patients complain of yeast infections after a
successful antibiotic treatment. These yeast infections range from a localized
nuisance to life threatening systemic diseases. Again here, a yeast infection
is nothing more and nothing less than vigorous mold overgrowth into the turf
left vacant after the massacre of bacteria brought about by antibiotics.
Nothing new here, either. It is what has
always happened after every victory of the molds over their archenemies the
bacteria since the world is world. Again here, another consequence of the
imbalance that remains after a successful antibiotic treatment.
And so now MRSA is the newest successful survivor strain,
the new evil superstar, the public enemy número
uno. And sooner or later another antibiotic will appear that will destroy
it, you can be certain of that. And then MRSA will be kaput and stop being a
threat.
But you can also bet your last dollar against a donut that
some descendents of the MRSA’s will survive the onslaught and become the same
threat that MRSA is today, or worse.
It is obvious that the long-term solution here does not lie
in just staying a leap ahead of resistant bacteria with some new antibiotic or
other, a leap that is becoming shorter and shorter and that is spawning strains
of more ferociously pathogenic bacteria faster and faster.
But don’t tell this to the Allopaths. They are worried
enough as things are, franticly pulling one antibiotic after another from their
magician’s hat. For them, new antibiotics is the only thing that stands between
mankind and the otherwise inevitable hecatomb that will befall us by more and
more antibiotic-resistant microorganisms. For so long have Allopaths relied on
antibiotics as the only solution, for so long have they ignored Homeopathy,
that by now they have developed some kind of professional torticollis that
doesn’t allow them to look at Homeopathy, not even askance, not even if they
were interested in finding some help beyond the bounds of Allopathy to assist
them in this plight.
And Homeopathy could become so handy here!
For starters, Homeopathy does not go about killing
microorganisms helter-skelter, like antibiotics do. Homeopathy, by means of
restoring balance everywhere—something Allopathy is utterly incapable of
doing—can also restore peace and harmony amongst the approximately 200 strains
of bacteria and molds that pullulate us.
And as it restores balance, Homeopathy also vitalizes the
Whole organism. Let us recall that microorganisms only attack devitalized
organs and structures, meaning that bacteria are likely to become as meek as
lambs when they find vitality everywhere. In Medical parlance, whenever this
happens, patients become colonized by bacteria, instead of being infected.
Often the same bacteria can be colonizers or infectious, though, depending on
how vitalized their host is.
In our everyday Homeopathic practice it is common to see,
particularly in children on a steady diet of antibiotics and still very sick,
how one or a few courses of a successful Homeopathic treatment heal the
patients, and make further antibiotic treatment unnecessary.
Meaning that fewer Homeopathised patient will need to
receive antibiotics, and that consequently fewer bacterial strains will become
exposed to their natural or chemically modified biological nemeses. And that
consequently those bacteria, lacking full and frequent exposure, will take
longer to become resistant to antibiotics.
Here again, and although not properly documented, alas! it
is also common clinical experience to see how gratifyingly well Homeopathised
patients respond to antibiotics when in real need of them.
By the same token, Homeopathy also frequently acts as an
excellent preventive.
Again here, it is also common occurrence that people who
have a propensity to fall ill frequently stop doing so after a successful
Homeopathic treatment.
For instance, I currently have under my care a patient in
her 50’s. Her lungs are damaged. She teaches. Every winter she would
predictably fall ill and need quantities of antibiotics to recover, and
precariously at that. A couple of weeks ago in my office she remarked that, so
far, this is the second winter she has felt fully healthy, even though many of
her students, with whom she shares the same closed classroom, have kept on
falling ill again and again—that is, two years without receiving antibiotics of
any kind.
Again here, less exposure of bacteria to antibiotics.
Still, though, antibiotics can be very necessary—even though
they are far from being the solution to this problem.
We have come to realize that antibiotics are, at best, only
a stop-gag tool to combat microorganisms that have decided to run amok.
Put succinctly, one cannot expect to solve the problem of
infectious diseases using antibiotics or their chemical modifications, because
along eons of perpetual conflict bacteria have consistently defused attacks carried
out with these mold-produced biological weapons, and then kept forever in their
genes the memory of how they did it.
And because it is not a matter of lackadaisically discarding
a worn out antibiotic to replace it with a newer one in its stead, either.
Remember that the number of antibiotics is finite, as it is finite the number
of molds that produce them.
And because, to boot, antibiotics, incapable of
discriminating, can also be harmful to bacteria that are beneficial to us, with
consequences that are still not fully known.
However, antibiotics is all we currently have to
consistently eliminate many full-blown infections, despite of the fact that
bacteria will inevitably thwart their deadly effectiveness sooner or later.
It is therefore imperative to associate some treatment that
may delay the obsolescence of each new antibiotic that pops up in the market.
Homeopathy has the potential to fulfill very nicely such a
role, due to its unique capability of vitalizing and of bringing about balance
in the totality of the patients—a totality that includes their bacterial flora,
both normal and pathogenic.
The use of
Homeopathy, then, associated with anti-infectious Allopathic treatment, could
allow safely doling each new antibiotic with a miser’s hand, and so delaying
the moment when another surviving bacterial strain may blunt its therapeutic
usefulness.
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Edited by Jose Miguel Mullen, MD, MD (H), MFHom.,
Homeopathic Physician.
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