WHAT IS HOMEOPATHY?
Homeopathy is a scientific system of natural medicine in which the medicines stimulate the patient’s own self-healing and self-regulating forces to restore health and maintain well-being.
In Homeopathy it is recognized that the symptoms you have are not the illness, they are the results of your body’s effort to remove the actual causes of the illness. The treatment does not aim to suppress or abolish the symptoms at a superficial level. It helps your body to carry out its intended plan – and thereby to remove the real 
cause of the illness. Every aspect of your symptoms as well as your mental, emotional and physical characteristics lead the homeopathic physician to the particular remedy that your healing forces need in order to be able to restore you to health.
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CAN HOMOEOPATHY HELP ME?
Homoeopathy has helped millions of people in all parts of the world over nearly two hundred years. It has helped them to overcome both mild and serious illness and to continue to improve their health over many years. Even complicated illness for which there is no clear diagnosis can respond very well (and sometimes astonishingly quickly) to homoeopathy.
WHERE DID HOMOEOPATHY COME FROM?
The “Father” of Homoeopathy was a physician, Samuel Christian Hahnemann, born in Germany in 1775.
Through tests he conducted on healthy individuals (including himself) and on patients, Hahnemann found that if a substance caused certain symptoms when given to healthy persons, it could be given to patients suffering from a similar set of symptoms and it would cure them.
The basis of Homoeopathy is “like may be cured by like”
HOMOEOPATHIC REMEDIES
The medicines used in homoeopathy are traditionally called remedies. They come from animal, mineral and vegetable sources, but they are very different from drugs and herbal medicines.
The remedies are prepared by a process called “potentization” in which the substance is repeatedly diluted and shaken vigorously, leading to an extremely dilute liquid in which only the ‘energy imprint’ of the original substances remains. With each further cycle of dilution and shaking, however, the potency of the remedy increases! It is as if this process taps ever deeper into the energy essence of the original substance.
Since homoeopathic remedies, especially the higher potencies act by stimulating the patients’ own healing forces – their “life force”, the remedies are highly effective yet free from side effects and other consequences that do arise with the use of pharmaceutical drugs. In other words, homoeopathic medicines are “body friendly’ in every sense.
Note: Very occasionally, when the remedy starts to work, the body may react by making the symptoms a bit worse for a very short period. This is called an aggravation, and it usually indicates that the right remedy has been selected and that a good outcome can be anticipated.
YOU ARE UNIQUE
In homoeopathy, every patient is treated as a completely unique individual. No two people are exactly alike, either in health or disease. During the consultation the homoeopathic doctor tries to find out from the patient the unique way in which his or her defense mechanisms are reacting to the problems – this being the pointer to the remedy that would best help the self-healing forces to effect cure under those particular circumstances. Thus, different patients having the same ‘diagnosis’, according to western medical terminology, may be helped and cured by different remedies.
THE WHOLE PERSON
Whatever the nature of the complaints that a person comes for help with; there may be disturbances on the mental, emotional, spiritual, electromagnetic, chemical or structural level. The homoeopathic approach recognizes this and seeks to treat all these disturbances in an integrated holistic manner. Its aim is to restore equilibrium at the emotional, mental and physical levels by stimulating the intrinsic defence and curative mechanisms – the vital force.
THE RANGE OF APPLICATION OF HOMOEOPATHY
The range of health problems that can be effectively addressed with homoeopathy is very wide indeed! Sudden, severe illness, long-standing chronic ones, undiagnosed and supposedly ‘incurable’ illness have all been helped in some measure by homoeopathy. It is gentle, yet effective. Unborn babies, new-born babies, toddlers, school children, men and women of all ages including extreme old age – all benefit from homoeopathy.
From anxiety, depression, grief, hyperactivity and some other behavioral disorders in children, mental exhaustion, shock, panic attacks & phobias, through anaemia, arthritis, asthma, bed-wetting, bronchitis, eczema and other skin diseases, hypertension, piles, sexual problems and other special problems of women and of men, to rheumatism, sleep disorders, viral illness and warts – homoeopathy can help.
Because it addresses the entire person at all three levels (emotional, mental and physical), homoeopathy can be particularly effective in treating stress, shock and other mental and emotional disturbances that are very difficult to treat by other means
While the most spectacular results are often seen when homoeopathy is used on its own, there are many circumstances to which others treatments e.g. surgery, osteopathy and chiropractic and others may be needed. The homeopathic physician is always on the alert to recognize such situations and make the appropriate recommendations.
Even when other treatment is required, homoeopathy can still provide tremendous support. For example, homoeopathic treatment can speed the union of a fractured bone, can aid the recovery following major surgery, and can improve the quality of life even in advanced cases of incurable diseases.
One of the most exciting things about homoeopathy is that it offers a way to improve your resistance, health and well-being even if you are not ill at all! This is through something called constitutional treatment, which is not only particularly effective in chronic illness, but is also a great help to those who feel well and want to take active steps to stay well.
Dr A. B. Aiyesimoju, M. B. B. S. (Ibadan) F.M.C.P. (Nig) Dip. Homoeopathy (British Institute of Homoeopathy) fellow of the British Institute of Homoeopathy. Consultant Physician, Neurologist & Homoeopath.
If you’ve been thinking about trying alternative or complementary medicine for one or more chronic or recurrent conditions, here are ten reasons to try classical homeopathy.
- Homeopathy treats the whole person – body and mind. So most physical, mental, and emotional conditions can be improved or healed with homeopathy.
- Homeopathic remedies are made from a wide variety of plant, mineral, and animal substances. They are so diluted they are safe and effective without toxic side effects.
- Homeopathy does not suppress symptoms. It strengthens the natural healing processes of the mind-body and helps it to achieve better physical, mental, and emotional health over time.
- Homeopathy is very individualized. Five people with the same medical diagnosis may receive five different remedies, because homeopathy treats a specific individual’s symptoms, not specific diseases.
- Homeopathy uses the principle of minimum dose. Since remedies act as a catalyst to help the body heal itself, many clients take their remedy only once every few months.
- Because homeopathy stimulates the body to heal itself, it strengthens the immune system and helps the body come back into balance. Over time, people become less prone to allergies or serious illnesses.
- Homeopathic remedies are tested on healthy human volunteers, not on animals, and are inexpensive compared to many medications and supplements.
- Homeopathy treatment is a valuable alternative or complementary treatment for injuries, acute illnesses, and surgeries. It does not interfere with conventional medical treatment.
Homeopathy works effectively and safely with animals, infants, children, adolescents, adults, pregnant women, and elders.