http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/extract/337/oct30_1/a2281

http://www.politics.co.uk/opinion-formers/press-releases/royal-college-physicians-sir-michael-rawlins-attacks-traditional-ways-assessing-evidence-$1245035$365674.htm

Bothese articles would appear to bring into doubt the value of conventional trials and also add that increased value should be placed upon other forms of evidence. Mmmmmm, interesting. Isn’t this what homeopaths have been trying to say all along.

Also James with regard to books my recommendation would be to get to know the works of Hahnemann, Kent, Dudgeon, Close, Roberts etc. They will give you a firm foundation in what is described as classical homeopathy. Read these beforer the more modern additions.
Regards

Many thanks for your book suggestions.
I continue to explore the vast treasure of old Homeopathy books in google book search. Several books mentioned by Dr. Margaret Tyler in her wonderful “Homeopathic Drug Pictures” (I don’t think that one is available in Google), such as “Cyclopeida of Drug Pathogenesy” by Allens (4 volumes) and Constantine Herring’s Materia Medica (about 10 volumes), are all sitting there on the google servers waiting to be downloaded or read.

I have also discoverd Burnett, Kent and others – they are starting to become familiar friends for spare time reading and yes there is an enormous wealth of medical wisdom waiting for any who wish to learn.

I’ve been meaning to ask you what Homeopathy books you might suggest, including those regarding acute prescribing, for both the general reader and for those who wish a wee bit more detail. I’ve been sampling the old Homeopathy books available from Google book search. Some of them are surprisingly detailed and interesting though badly out of date.

Don’t dismiss the old books! They may be lacking the modern remedies and some modern scientific terminology, but illness is illness and even if we change the way we describe it or model it in different ways, it is what it is. What worked well for homeopaths 150 years ago in acute situations continues to work just as well today. The old authors were often brilliant observers of the fine distinctions between remedy states, so they’re well worth reading. It’s a skill that’s not so common these days with our tendency to focus on the labels, quick fixes and a one-size-fits-all approach to medicine, but immersing yourself in these old books is a very good way to sharpen your own abilities to perceive these subtle differentiations.

For modern self-help manuals, personally I don’t think you can do much better than Miranda Castro’s “The Complete Homeopathy Handbook”. It’s a very good basic introduction to the therapy as well.

And if you want the real nuts and bolts, then go to the source — Hahnemann’s Organon of Medicine 6th edition. It’s available online.

I am really interested in the reasons you think a placebo arm of a trial should involve actors rather than homeopaths proscribing the pills.

Because there has been a kind of ‘field effect’ noted repeatedly with homeopathic provings whereby people peripherally involved with the proving, but who haven’t taken the remedy themselves, produce unusual and distinctive symptoms which are characteristic of the proving. Patients have also frequently reported experiencing a marked improvement in their symptoms from a distinct point in time which occurs before they take the remedy. The start of this improvement frequently correlates with the moment when the homeopath decides which remedy they’re going to prescribe.

So if there is a non-local treatment effect operating in homeopathy (which is presently lumped in with ‘placebo’) then it needs to be adequately controlled for if you are conducting a trial to test the effectiveness of homeopathy as a therapy.

(See Harald Walach’s work, eg. The Efficacy Paradox in Randomized Controlled Trials of CAM and Elsewhere: Beware of the Placebo Trap. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. June 2001: 213-218.
Generalized Entanglement: A New Theoretical Model for Understanding the Effects of Complementary and Alternative Medicine. The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. June 2005: 549-559.)

jeff wrote:

I presume you mean, you wouldn’t endorse its use. Why not.

Personally speaking, homeoprophylaxis doesn’t make much sense to me. I prefer to work with what’s manifest and which I can prescribe for with a much higher degree of confidence. There are others who specialise in homeoprophylaxis and claim success for their methods. I can’t comment on those as I have no experience of them, and I don’t endorse anything I haven’t checked out and investigated thoroughly for myself.

Homeoprophylaxis doesn’t make much sense to me because homeopathy treats the patient, not the disease. It’s an individualised therapy which is at its most effective when used in response to an individual case of illness with a prescription selected according to the characteristic symptoms displayed by that individual. If you don’t have any symptoms of illness, then you’ve nothing to prescribe on.

Homeoprophylaxis is based on the generalised symptoms of the complaint. Homeopathy is much less effective when prescribed on general rather than characteristic symptoms because you’re not matching the individual with the specifics of their individual case of illness. And even though epidemic diseases have a much more universal and limited range of symptom expression compared to chronic complaints, there is invariably more than one remedy applicable. Which one would you prescribe prophylactically? You could get lucky, but it’s all a bit too hit and miss for my liking.

“There are some very good self-help manuals for acute prescribing in minor injuries and childhood illnesses and many people have made successful use of them.”

I’ve been meaning to ask you what Homeopathy books you might suggest, including those regarding acute prescribing,
for both the general reader and for those who wish a wee bit more detail. I’ve been sampling the old Homeopathy books available from Google book search. Some of them are surprisingly detailed and interesting though badly out of date.

thanks.

I am really interested in the reasons you think a placebo arm of a trial should involve actors rather than homeopaths proscribing the pills. Do you think there would be an undetectable difference in outcome for patients proscribed a remedy by a homeopath and receiving one made with the the correct starting material, succession and being proscribed a remedy by a homeopath and being given a pill prepared from deionized water?