Homoeopathy - errors in prescribing
When I go to a Homoeopathic conference in our area I usually meet other doctors. It is not uncommon for some of them to ask me "doctor what remedy you give for tonsillitis" another may ask "what will you give for asthma"? etc. Kent says "Such a thing has no place in my mind, and I look upon one who speaks in that way as a man untrained in homoeopathics. I truly have lost my patient over such things, for the old gray-heads, who have practiced for years and pretended to practice Homoeopathy, do not hesitate to say that "the best remedy for epilepsy" is so and so, What nonsense ! That is not adjusting the remedy to the state of the patient that existed before he had these structural changes and fixed groups of symptoms, for if you adjust a remedy to the pathological condition you are not adjusting it to the patient, to his very beginnings down to the present time."
He need depend on pathological results, all he needs to have is symptoms.
MANAGEMENT OF CANCER
First we have to identify what constitute health. The healthy man is not reminded of his parts. Example: He passes his stool without pain in the part. If he have pain or bleeding he is reminded of this part. If he respires without sensation we say it is normal and he is in freedom, but if chest is burning and smarting and wheezing follow he is reminded of it, and these sensations constitute symptoms.
Second step is to identify what constitute sick
If the patient is waxy and pallid, has papules and pustules, or swollen and varicose veins with red face, red eyes, etc., these the physician can see and note down. This is subjective symptoms
Again there are things that the physician cannot see and that the patient cannot tell, that the mother, sister, husband or wife should relate to the physician at his office. This is objective symptoms.
These symptoms constitute what there is knowable of sickness, that which appears to the mind of the physician upon which he makes up his verdict. When the strong symptoms are all collected together the physician in studying the case must separate out those things that were observed years ago from those things that are observed today, noting how they have changed and why changed.
Sometimes they have been altered by drugs so that the whole nature of the economy is giving out a different group of symptoms. The physician must learn the changes all along the line, from beginning to end ; what symptoms presented this sick man ten years ago, and what symptoms represent him now. Perhaps now he has pathological conditions in his lungs, liver and kidneys.
The physician who has been for many years observing former and present conditions in this manner, by hearing the symptoms can practically locate the morbid anatomy ; he can tell where it will appear, knows when pus is in organs and where, and he can predict pretty well what is soon to go on in the economy.
I would rather trust to a careful study of the symptoms than most physician's written diagnosis of phthisis, or organic diseases of the liver or of the heart.
The symptoms do not lie, they do not exist from opinions of men who have thumped and pounded over the human body to find out what is going on inside, which is in many instances confusing even to the best diagnosticians.
To become conversant with symptoms, to judge of the sphere and progress of disease by the study of symptomatology, is the requirement necessary for the homoeopath.
To think of remedies for cancer is disarray, but to think of remedies for the patient who appears to have cancer is orderly, and you will be amazed to know what wonderful changes will take place in these conditions when remedies that correspond to the conditions before the cancer began are administered. Cancer is the result of disorder, which disorder must be turned in order and must be healed.
PHYSICAL EXAMINATION AND SYMPTOMS
Bystanders will say to the patient : "That doctor cannot know much ; he did not give you a physical examination."
After the examination of the symptoms has been made there is no reason why you should not make a physical examination of the patient ; but do not let this divest you of becoming thoroughly educated in studying symptoms, because the real study of sickness is the meditation of his symptoms, and to become wise in symptoms is to become an able prescriber.
Study physical diagnosis to your heart's content, but weigh carefully what you discover and compare it with the symptoms in order to determine what the different symptoms mean. You cannot study the symptoms of man without becoming extremely well acquainted with the nervous system, respiratory symptoms, digestive system, etc. The anatomy of the all the organs should be thoroughly known.
The physician should be conversant with anatomy and physiology, but by studying the symptomatology he acquires a knowledge of physiology which it is impossible to obtain in any other way ; he acquires a knowledge of the functions and operations of arteries, nerves and muscles because they call attention to themselves when in disturbance, and he sees therefore how the symptoms manifest themselves.
By studying the symptom in the recorded pathogenesis one may learn much about true pathology. Morbid anatomy furnishes no basis for prescribing, but true pathology is often of the greatest benefit, helping the image of the sickness to shape itself before the mind.
The true morbid sensations of a healthy organism are what we must first consider. It is first assumed that the organism is in a state of health and capable of performing its functions, and then the morbid sensations of this healthy organism are the symptoms that come to the physician as a antecedent of death in parts, and finally death of the whole.