I became convinced enough to hand my coveted PhD studentship over to my best friend and sign on for a three-year, full-time homeopathy training course.
Now, as an experienced homeopath, it is "science" that is biting me on the bottom. I know homeopathy works, not only because I've seen it with my own eyes countless times, but because scientific research confirms it. And yet I keep reading reports in the media saying that homeopathy doesn't work and that this scientific evidence doesn't exist. The facts, it seems, are being ignored. By the end of , randomised control trials the gold standard in medical research comparing homeopathy with placebo or conventional treatment had been published in peer-reviewed journals — 74 were able to draw firm conclusions: 63 were positive for homeopathy and 11 were negative.
Five major systematic reviews have also been carried out to analyse the balance of evidence from RCTs of homeopathy — four were positive Kleijnen, J, et al ; Linde, K, et al ; Linde, K, et al ; Cucherat, M, et al and one was negative Shang, A et al. It's usual to get mixed results when you look at a wide range of research results on one subject, and if these results were from trials measuring the efficacy of "normal" conventional drugs, ratios of and in favour of a treatment working would be considered pretty persuasive.
Of course, the question of how homeopathy works is another matter. And that is where homeopathy courts controversy. It is indeed puzzling that ultra-high dilutions of substances, with few or no measurable molecules of the original substance left in them, should exert biological effects, but exert biological effects they do. There are experiments showing that homeopathic thyroxine can alter the rate of metamorphosis of tadpoles into frogs , that homeopathic histamine can alter the activity of white blood cells , and that under the right conditions, homeopathic sodium chloride can be made to release light in the same way as normal sodium chloride.
He cites a trial that was done of Chinese herbal medicine, which compared personalised treatment and standard treatment with placebo for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome. Cope also points out that the NHRMC review only considered papers published in English when many homeopathy studies are published in other languages, especially German. But if so many people around the world are placing their faith in homeopathy, despite the evidence against it, Broom questions why homeopathy seeks scientific validation.
This site is being redeveloped. For all the latest ABC Health content click here. Features Have your say Share Print. What is homeopathy? Flawed criteria? Now they were coming as doctors in Southern India beginning in the s. Long story short, my father finally took me at the age of 4 to a Homeopathic doctor he met a few years earlier. He gave me a dose of Belladoma 30c. A month after the 1st medicine, he said take Sulphur 30c to complement the initial medicine.
Now this doctor wasn't a "Licensed Physician" back when my father first met him a few years before in However he cured my Dad's illness with "psora", an itch, he had over a 4 year period when he accidentally met him at the bank my father worked at. When he had the itch, his face would swell up when he digested any meats or fats such as butter. He was also physically fragile.
However after giving him Lycopodium 30c, his itching went away. Even when me moved to the U. Have a good day. I have "very sparingly" had painkillers or other common allopathic medication in the last 35 years of my life which , like any other man, has not been totally free from illnesses or ailments from time to time. Homeopathy IS effective. It is not just a hoax. It is being administered and consumed by many. It is well known that how medical councils around the world have been dismissing alternative medicine.
It is just like trying to measure "bliss" not just happiness. Take nano technology for instance, take the emergence of even more smaller sub-atomic particles very recently discovered. Utk, Delhi India Of course homeopathy works. Here's proof: I had the hiccups once, I rubbed some natural organic aloe on my neck, and my hiccups went away. Therefore, the only logical conclusion is that natural organic aloe on your neck cures hiccups. And just because there's no nuance on the internet, my example was how the homeopathy arguments always go.
Anecdotal evidence is weak, and correlation is not causation. Yes, not the medicines but the talkativeness of the homeopath. It takes some hours in every case for a homeopath to draw a conclusion about which medicine should be given.
The way they question the patient really does the magic and their confidence rather I should say over-confidence makes the patient believe them without second opinion.
Many patients say that are experimenting with homeo medicines to check whether it works or not, but in reality they are already convinced and are just trying to get some improvement to stand as a strong supporter of homeopathy. Homeo dosen't work through placebo effect, but works through logical convincing effect. I have heard somewhere from some homeopath that they carried out successful placebo control trails on animals.
Is it really possible to do blind studies with homeopathy medicines on any living being, since homeopaths claim that no two patients get the same medicine in homeopathy? No one knows how homeopathic medicines work, including homeopaths!!. How can a homeopath suggest a medicine without knowing how it works?
Dosen't it sound strange?? Many homeopaths claim that it is a science invented by modern doctors, but do you think that the medicine in 18cen was the same as what we see today? Did Hahnemann know what surgery and antibiotics were?
He tried to find something new, because the procedures adopted in those days were crude. He cannot be considered as a modern doctor as he dosen't know anything about advanced medical science.
Homeopathy is fake. In the 19th Centuary, homeopaths claimed that their treatments contained some amount of medicine, but since science has found no medicine in them, they now claim that water and alcohol have memory. I will say petrol, natural gas also has some memory.
Would a homoepath accept my claim? If he rejects it, on what grounds he can reject me, since he himself is in a big dilemma about the water memory concepts? People have emotions and homeopaths are tactically using that.
A homeopath on some Indian website mentioned that herbal medicines don't have any effect on complaints - I don't know with what material he is preparing homeo medicines. Herbal medicines also should be rejected if they do not have a scientific base, but blind studies are possible with them and effect can be standardized through phytochemical studies.
When a homeopath doesn't how his medicine works, how can he suggest a medicine to a patient? Work in genes stimulates internal energy bla bla bla They do some logical convincing and make some magic, if it's true that what homeopaths are doing in cancer, HIV etc. What happened to their so called immuno stimulative medicines, where immuno deficiency is the chief cause for AIDS? Many homeopaths are taking allopathic medicines for diabetes and hypertension - can't they live with their super-power homeo medicines?
Homeopathy has no role in its mother country. Is it really possible for a homeopath to treat a case without logical convincing? No, it is absolutely impossible as the convincing is the power which imparts medicinal properties to sugar pills.
Once in my child hood I challenged a homeopath that I would swallow all the pills from 3 bottles of 30X potency homeopathic medicines, which he said were very powerful. He said that he would not be responsible if something happened to me. I added those pills to my coffee as a supplement to sugar and nothing happened after taking them. When I asked, he said that they work when a problem is there and do no harm when no disease is there!!!
This is what homeopathy is. Beware of quacks. I am sorry if I have some mistakes in English, but I hope everybody understands the internal meaning of it. It is not important for the patient to know how his treatment works on him, but what if his doctor doesn't know how it works on his patient? It works best for those ailments which do well with no treatment; colds, headaches, pruritis ani etc. Try using it for a compound fractured femur or a penetrating injury to the eye and see just how effective it will be.
If it has not been proven to work by now it simply can't be proven. The only people who believe it works are Homeopaths and they have a financial incentive to believe in it, don't they? Don't waste your money. Barbara Lamb, Vancouver Canada Yep, homeopathy is right up there with numerology, palm reading, tea leaf reading, crystals, astrology and tarrot cards - it's all utter rubbish. Chris Carter, Christchurch, New Zealand It seems to me that homeopathy is to the school medicine what a christian is to an atheist.
Burgess from Norwich on his very detailed and clear explanation. Well articulated. I've been given homeopathic medication that is supposed to be taken for 6 months, and it's 2 months now and I have yet to feel the difference. However, I have been told that the recovery process is slow with these medicines which is why my dosage runs till 6 months! I think the medication I was given white balls of sugar with a little the chemical medicine.
Anyway - I will report closer to the date or when I start noticing improvements. Monica, India Australia Homeopathy does work. Navin, Kanpur, India It seems the main aggressors and skeptics in this argument are people from Commonwealth systems and the U. But I had to be twice or thrice during my high school days through my under graduation.
Linde, K. Are the clinical effects of homeopathy placebo effects? A meta-analysis of placebo-controlled trials. The Lancet , , Poitevin, B. Mechanism of Action of Homoeopathic Medicines. British Homeopathic Journa l, 84, Reilly, D. Is Evidence for Homeopathy Reproducible? Shipley, M. Controlled Trial of Homeopathic Treatment of Osteoarthritis. Lancet , What are the issues with laboratory research?
What are the issues with clinical research? What is the biomedical research model? How does the biomedical research model work with homeopathy? The following is an example of a pair of studies that attempted to answer this question. In the first study, the homeopathic remedy Rhus Tox, commonly used in patients with joint symptoms, was given to a randomized group of arthritis patients, and was not found to have any impact greater than placebo. In that case, there was no homeopathic evaluation and the remedy was not matched to the individual Shipley et al.
In the second study, homeopaths took the cases of patients with fibromyalgia muscle pain and stiffness and only those whose entire picture indicated Rhus Tox were entered into the study.
The patients in this study who received the Rhus Tox remedy did significantly better than those who received placebo. This is a better study for evaluating the homeopathic system of treatment Fisher et al. What research has been done? Studying a Single Homeopathic Remedy Five hundred adults with classical influenza were divided in half, with one group receiving the homeopathic remedy Oscillococcinum and the other placebo, in a double-blind fashion.
Interpretations of the study differed according to perspective: The authors felt the results could not be explained but required further research.
Studying Combined Remedies In homeopathy, sometimes multiple remedies that are indicated for relatively uniform conditions are used in combinations. Studying the Homeopathy System Itself Forty-six patients with rheumatoid arthritis were randomized to homeopathic remedies or placebo.
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