Principles Of Treatment
One of the main principles of homeopathic treatment is treating each person on a strict individualization and holistic basis. This means we take into account the unique symptoms of each person from all spheres of their health – mental, emotional and physical. We then take the totality of those symptoms and prescribe a remedy that best matches that person’s state as a whole.
We believe that when a person is sick, that sickness has a unique pattern. Everyone tends to get sick in a way that corresponds to the heredity, environmental factors, stresses and weaknesses that are unique to that individual. As a result, five people with headache may each require a different homeopathic remedy because they have five different set of symptoms. Treatment is thus individualized based on the unique way that each of those five people are experiencing headache.
The second principle of homeopathic treatment is that of a ‘minimum dose’ – a dose small and gentle yet powerful enough to initiate healing.
Hahnemann saw that medical practitioners of his time were using exceedingly high doses of crude toxic drugs which apart from causing side effects, were also proving fatal in many cases. To prevent this from happening in the homeopathic system, he discovered a new way to prepare his remedies, a process he called potentization. He began diluting and succusing his remedies, often to the point where no actual molecule could remain in it except the energetic footprint of it. He noticed that the remedies prepared this way were acting on a much deeper level of the person, without causing any toxic effects or side effects. These remedies were acting upon the vital force of the patient, a force within all of us which when gets mistuned, causes what we call disease. This mistuned life force, he believed could only be treated with a slightly stronger artificial energetic agent (a remedy), according to the law of similars.
Therefore, following the principle of minimum dose, we administer a dose which is just strong enough to initiate a healing response yet gentle enough to not cause any toxic effects or side effects. The repetition of a dose depends on the reaction of the patient to the first one, as everybody responds differently. Unnecessary repetition may lessen the response. Therefore, in homeopathy ‘less is better’.
The third principle of homeopathy is using a single remedy at a time. Just like a lock can only be opened with a specific key made for it, similarly, only one remedy is required at a time to unlock and trigger the healing process. After carefully analyzing a person’s case, homeopaths arrive at a single remedy which best matches that individual’s symptomatology in totality.
However, after a particular remedy, there may occur a shift in the symptoms of a person where old symptoms may come back to the surface or different symptoms may arise which could indicate a need to administer a different remedy.