The single dose: the patient is considered as a global entity

Hahnemann has used the Law of similars to cure acute diseases and obtained sensational results, which has made the medical profession of that period extremely jealous, and apothecaries resentful as they felt cheated. Scarlet fever, pneumonia, cholera; all the diseases once greatly feared were successfully treated and their mortality was extremely reduced.

Despite the underlying desire to erase History, we could show many statistics dating from that century that clearly prove the superiority of the homeopathic treatment. For example, records of the French army could reveal how homeopathic physicians saved most of the patients suffering from dysentery during the siege of Sebastopol, which led to a victory. Thousands of American cities keep statistics showing how homeopathy has reduced the mortality of the yellow fever, the diphtheria, or the cholera. As for pneumonia, the classical medicine resulted in a mortality of 30 to 34%, while homeopathic hospitals only reported a mortality of 0.3 to 0.7, with the same amount of patients…etc.

However, Hahnemann soon got to face setbacks: homeopathy, in patients suffering from chronic diseases, could cure the first acute attack, but was less efficient on recurrences, and the treatment often failed afterwards. In other words, a remedy similar to the disease symptoms can relieve the symptoms, but the chronic affection will not be cured: the ill patient is not cured even if all body organs are relieved one after the other.

So, during nearly 12 years, Hahnemann will learn from his failures and reach the following conclusion: the Law of similars is not to be blamed as it is universal and “works” well on non chronic diseases. The problem is thus linked to the fact that the acute remedy is similar to part of the disease to be treated only, that is similar to the group of symptoms linked to the “re emergence” of the chronic disease, which is only the “visible part of the iceberg”.

In the treatment of a chronic disease, the physician must find a remedy similar to the symptoms of the ill patient when he is not undergoing an acute attack, and only partially take into account the acute symptoms (although there always exists a correlation between the acute remedy and the “underneath” chronic remedy). This is why a homeopath will question you on many aspects that seem completely unrelated to what you are complaining about. This also explains why a physician will never give you more than one medicine at the time: the medicine that will treat the general disorder (see below “Diseases and treatments”). There is always more than one organ affected: in fact, the symptoms felt in one area correspond to the local expression of a general affection. The role of the homeopath is to synthesize the different symptoms.