Homoeo Info

A range of complementary therapies such as homeopathy and aromatherapy are to be regulated by a new body.
The Natural HealthCare Council is due to begin work in April. Currently, anyone can offer a complementary medicine service.
The watchdog will set standards and have the power to strike off those deemed incompetent, although membership of the body will be voluntary.
The Patients Association said the move to regulate was "welcome and overdue".
A spokeswoman for the charity, which provides patients with a forum to share experiences of healthcare, said the fact that anyone can provide complementary medicines and treatment had been a "a source of concern".
"Patients will feel more secure as a result of this new body and they will know who to contact if they are unhappy with their treatment," she said.
A lack of regulation has prompted calls for a body to monitor conduct and standards among complementary health practitioners.
Britons spend around £130m a year on treatments like aromatherapy and reflexology.
Those who practice the therapies will be able to register with the new governing body which is being set up by the Prince of Wales's Foundation for Integrated Health.
Spokesman Ian Cambray Smith explained that regulation was necessary to provide "public confidence".
BBC News, UK - Jan 5, 2008

Labels: UK

So-called "alternative" therapies, mostly derived from ancient healing traditions and superstitions, have a strong appeal for people who feel left behind by the explosive growth of scientific knowledge. Paradoxically, however, their nostalgia for a time when things seemed simpler and more natural is mixed with respect for the power of modern science (Toumey 1996). They want to believe that "natural" healing practices can be explained by science. Purveyors of alternative medicine have, therefore, been quick to invoke the language and symbols of science. Not surprisingly, the mechanisms proposed to account for the alleged efficacy of such methods as touch therapy, psychic healing, and homeopathy involve serious misrepresentations of modern physics.
Homeopathy, founded by a German physician, Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843), is a relative newcomer. Homeopathy is based on the so-called "law of similars" (similia similibus curantur), which asserts that substances that produce a certain set of symptoms in a healthy person can cure those same symptoms in someone who is sick. Although there are related notions in Chinese medicine, Hahnemann seems to have arrived at the idea independently. Hahnemann spent much of his life testing natural substances to find out what symptoms they produced and prescribing them for people who exhibited the same symptoms. Although the purely anecdotal evidence on which he based his conclusions would not be taken seriously today, homeopathy as currently practiced still relies almost entirely on Hahnemann's listing of substances and their indications for use.
Natural substances, of course, are often acutely toxic. Troubled by the side effects that often accompanied his medications, Hahnemann experimented with diluting them. After each successive dilution, he subjected the solution to vigorous shaking, or "succussion." He made the remarkable discovery that although dilution eliminated the side effects, it did not diminish the effectiveness of the medications. This is rather grandly known as "the law of infinitesimals."
Hahnemann actually made a third "discovery," which his followers no longer mention. "The sole true and fundamental cause that produces all the countless forms of disease," he writes in his Organon, "is psora." Psora is more commonly known as "itch." This principle does not seem to involve any laws of physics and is in any case ignored by modern followers of Hahnemann.
By means of successive dilutions, extremely dilute solutions can be achieved rather easily. The dilution limit is reached when the volume of solvent is unlikely to contain a single molecule of the solute. Hahnemann could not have known that in his preparations he was, in fact, exceeding the dilution limit. Although he was contemporary with the physicist Amadeo Avogadro (1776-1856), Hahnemann's Organon der Rationellen Heilkunde was published in 1810, one year before Avogadro advanced his famous hypothesis, and many years before other physicists actually determined Avogadro's number. (Avogadro showed that there is a large but finite and specific number of atoms or molecules in a mole of substance, specifically 6.022 x 1023. A mole is the molecular weight of a substance expressed in grams. Thus, a mole of water, H2O, molecular weight 2 + 16 = 18, is 18 grams. So there are 6.022 x 1023 water molecules in 18 grams of water.)
Modern day followers of Hahnemann, however, are perfectly aware of Avogadro's number. Nevertheless, they regularly exceed the dilution limit -- often to an astonishing extent. I recently examined the dilutions listed on the labels of dozens of standard homeopathic remedies sold over the counter in health stores, and increasingly in drug stores, as remedies for everything from nervousness to flu. These remedies are normally in the form of lactose tablets on which a single drop of the "diluted" medication has been placed. The "solvent" is usually a water/alcohol mixture. The lowest dilution I found listed on any of these bottles was 6X, but most of the dilutions were 30X or even, in the case of oscillococcinum, an astounding 200C. (Oscillococcinum, which is derived from duck liver, is the standard homeopathic remedy for flu. As we will see, however, its widespread use poses little threat to the duck population.)
What do these notations mean? The notation 6X means that the active substance is diluted 1:10 in a water-alcohol mixture and succussed. This procedure (diluting and succussing) is repeated sequentially six times. The concentration of the active substance is then one part in ten raised to the sixth power (106), or one part per million. An analysis of the pills would be expected to find numerous impurities at the parts-per-million level.
The notation 30X means the 1:10 dilution, followed by succussion, is repeated thirty times. That results in one part in 1030, or 1 followed by thirty zeroes. I don't know what the name for that number is, but let me put it this way: you would need to take some two billion pills, a total of about a thousand tons of lactose, to expect to get even one molecule of the medication. In other words, the pills contain nothing but lactose and the inevitable impurities. This is literally no-medicine medicine.
And what of 200C? That means the active substance is sequentially diluted 1:100 and succussed two hundred times. That would leave you with only one molecule of the active substance to every one hundred to the two hundredth power molecules of solvent, or 1 followed by four hundred zeroes (10400). But the total number of atoms in the entire universe is estimated to be about one googol, which is 1 followed by a mere one hundred zeroes.
This is the point at which we are all supposed to realize how ridiculous this is and share a good laugh. But homeopaths don't laugh. They've done the same calculation. And while they agree that not a single molecule of the active substance could remain, they contend it doesn't matter, the water/alcohol mixture somehow remembers that the substance was once there. The process of succussion is presumed to charge the entire volume of the liquid with the same memory. Is there any evidence for such a memory?
Skeptical Inquirer - Jan 4, 2008

Labels: UK

One of the most significant but widely misunderstood phenomena is the placebo effect. Research shows that the placebo effect can be greater and is far more ubiquitous than commonly thought.
If it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't.
-Tweedledee, in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass
One of the questions that skeptics are asked most persistently is to explain how acupuncture, homeopathy, faith healing, Qigong, and other treatments work. Skeptics often use the placebo effect-a response to the act of being treated, not to the treatment itself-as an answer, but usually to no avail. I believe that's because most people, both logical and fuzzy thinkers, don't truly understand what the placebo effect is.
Spontaneous remission and the placebo effect, which are known as nonspecific effects, are significant phenomena that have great impact on consumers and health-care professionals. Recovery from illness, whether it follows self-medication, legitimate treatment, or avant-garde therapies, may lead one to conclude that the treatment received was the cause of the return to good health.
A common saying is that if you treat a cold it will last a week, but if you leave it alone it will be gone in seven days. Even serious diseases have periods of exacerbation and remission; arthritis and multiple sclerosis are prime examples. There are even cases of cancers inexplicably disappearing. The major logical error in plotting disease progress is: post hoc, ergo propter hoc ("after it, therefore, because of it"). This common fallacy credits improvement to a specific treatment just because the improvement followed the treatment.
H. K. Beecher's seminal paper "The Powerful Placebo" (Beecher 1955) is among the most frequently cited and was undoubtedly responsible for the double-blind study design having been adopted as the universal standard. Beecher reported on twenty-six studies and arrived at an average placebo response rate of 32.5 percent. From this figure comes the often cited statement that a fixed fraction (one-third) of the population responds to placebos. But this is a myth. A recent paper (Roberts et al. 1993) concluded that "under conditions of heightened expectations, the power of nonspecific effects (placebos) far exceeds that commonly reported in the literature."
John E. Dodes/Skeptical Inquirer - 4 Jan 2008

Labels: UK

Aromatherapy, homoeopathy and other popular complementary therapies are to be regulated for the first time under a government-backed scheme to be established this year.
The new Natural Healthcare Council – which is being backed by the Prince of Wales – will be able to strike off errant or incompetent practitioners. It will also set minimum standards for practitioners to ensure that therapists are properly qualified.
Patients will be able to complain to the council about practitioners and the new body will be modelled on the General Medical Council and other similar statutory bodies.
Millions of Britons currently spend £130 million a year on complementary treatments and it is estimated that this will reach £200 million over the next four years. Among the practices to be covered by the scheme would be aromatherapy, reflexology, massage, nutrition, shiatzu, reiki, naturopathy, yoga, homoeopathy, cranial osteopathy and the Alexander and Bowen techniques.
Research also shows that more than two thirds (68 per cent) of people in the UK believe that complementary medicine is as valid as conventional treatment.
However, there have been long-standing concerns over its regulation. At present anyone can set themselves up as an acupuncturist, homoeopath, herbalist, or other complementary therapist. However, a poll for The Times found that three quarters of people assumed that anyone practising complementary therapy is trained and registered by a professional body.
Nigel Hawkes/Times Online, UK - Jan 4, 2008

Labels: UK

According to the headlines this week, NHS homoeopathy is in sharp decline. Only 37 per cent of NHS trusts provide any sort of homoeopathic service, and more than a quarter have stopped or reduced funding over the past year. This threatens the survival of those homoeopathic clinics that remain.
If the NHS withdrew funding for all treatments that had no evidence base to support them, there would be some considerable holes in conventional medicine services. We should be clear that this debate is not about whether homoeopathy works or not. It is about resources.
The area of allergy exemplifies exactly why homoeopathy needs to take a back seat in the face of competing priorities. This week, the medical director of the Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital justified NHS funding for homoeopathy on the basis that it produced “a fairly large improvement” in 50 per cent of children with eczema.
There are millions of people with allergies, but only a handful of specialist NHS clinics, and pitifully little training for GPs in this area. There has been a sevenfold rise in hospital admissions for life-threatening allergy attacks over the past decade, and these could be prevented by specialist assessment and treatment, which simply doesn’t exist owing to lack of investment.
The relative few that are helped by homoeopathy have to be balanced against the needs of a much larger group currently with little or no services, some of whom will die without them. There is no question in my mind what health planners should do in these circumstances.
Vivienne Parry/Times Online, UK - Feb 1, 2008

Labels: UK

Homeopaths prescribe remedies for the "whole" person, and the practice of homeopathy is still based on the three principles established by Dr. Hahnemann. This is the "law of similars," the principle of the minimum dose and prescribing for the individual.
The law of similars states that a substance that can produce symptoms of illness in a well person can, in minute doses, cure similar symptoms of disease. The minimum dose states that by diluting a substance, its curative properties are enhanced and any side effects are eliminated.
Whole-person prescribing is probably the most important part of homeopathy, for the fundamental philosophy behind the practice is that each person is an individual and must be treated as such. A homeopath studies a person's temperament, personality, emotional and physical responses, even the food they like and dislike before prescribing.
Homeopaths believe that treatment works according to a set of rules known as the "Laws of Cure," and these state that:
a remedy begins to work from the top of the body downward it works from the inside out and from major to minor organs symptoms clear in reverse order of their appearance.
Homeopaths also believe that a person's constitution is made up of inherited and acquired physical, mental, and emotional characteristics and that these can be matched to a particular remedy that will improve their health, no matter what their illness.
Furthermore, people with similar characteristics and constitutions can be grouped under one of the constitutional remedy types, if they all share specific physical and emotional characteristics. Your constitutional type can change as your physique, health, and attitudes change, and some people can be a combination of constitutional types.
It is not clear exactly how homeopathy works, but studies have proved that it does. Hahnemann believed that remedies worked to balance the body so it was able to heal itself.
Ricky Hussey / American Chronicle, CA - Jan 3, 2008

Indore: The department of AYUSH, ministry of health and family welfare, Government of India is organizing AROGYA, a comprehensive health fair on Ayurveda, Yoga, Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy from January 4-7 next year at Lalbagh Palace ground here.
Every year such a fair is organized in New Delhi to showcase the strengths, potential and the latest advancements made in India in the traditional medicine sector and Homoeopathy. The AROGYA fair showcases the advancements in clinical practices, research and documentation, manufacturing and the processes involved in these systems of medicines and also the medicinal plants sector.
This annual fair in Delhi attracts international researchers, manufacturers and processors and people from all walks of life who evince a great interest in the ancient and classical knowledge systems of Ayurved, Siddha and Unani medicines and wonderful therapeutic effects of yoga which is globally famous as drugless therapy system.
Central Chronicle, India - Dec 30, 2007

Labels: India