Minutus

Not wanting to treat my friend over the phone, I
suggest she goes see a homeopath in her town.
Off course I was really curious about the prescripion.

My friend calls me in tears. Knowing quite a bit about
homeopathy, she was really hurt that the homeopath
could label her as "belonging to such a
constitutional", and she emphatically refused to take
it. So I decided to treat her over the phone, only to
agree with her that the rx couldn't be any farther
from correct, not matching her mentals, physicals nor
general picture. Now my friend is really wary of
homeopaths, since she swears homeopathy has hurt her
in the past, and us homeopaths are blinded to the fact
that the wrong remedy can mess up a person's life if
the patient is too sensitive, as she is.
So I have two concerns:
Some people who are getting certified these days would
have to go back to school urgently; and:
Patients knowing enough about homeopathy can be a
great asset (as it was in her case, in a way)... but
can also pose some complications. For example, I now
would have to spend countless hours on the phone with
my friend trying to convince her to take the remedy I
have in mind for her...
What do you guys think? Is it far more difficult to
treat patients who have a good knowledge of homeopathy
to you? How does this affect your practice?

Regards,
Eric.
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I find them very difficult. They list their symptoms as a 'list of items from the rep'. It's very difficult for the ones I have worked with to stop and just verbalize their symptoms in their own words. Also their tendency to 'second guess' and to pronounce the remedy they think they should have. And another common problem - I've had one list off about 25 remedies she had 'tried' over the course of a week before comming. Ugh!

However, another aspect of this problem - as a mother - I was very upset by the remedy given to my daughter by a homeopath where she lives in Germany. I can't see any possible way that remedy was suited to her. It did not help. I encouraged her to try another, and his prescription was equally wrong for her. Again, I kept my mouth shut and she tried the remedy, but it did not help. Now she does not want to go to another homeopath and calls home to handle acutes.

Thanks for your input, Donna. I have had some patients
who also quote their symptoms out of the rep.
The story of the patient who tried the 25 remedies...
oh, dear...
I can clearly imagine how upsetting it was for you to
see your daughter receive those unfit remedies.
Which brings another question to mind. How can we as
homeopaths disagree so much about a specific patient?
If we had a vast majority of good practitioners,
shouldn't we agree at least 90% of the time?

--- Donna Rona wrote:
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In homeopathy school we were given some pointers about what sorts of
people tend to be difficult to treat. One on the list was--homeopathy
students (whether formal or informal, of course), and I'm sure "other
homeopaths" must have been on the list too!
Since I started studying h'y about a year after becoming a homeopathic
patient, I've had *lots* of years as one of those "bad patients".
My own first h'th finally impressed on me *not* to deliver rubrics
instead of simply describing my experience. He had to ask it again and
again, but eventually I did get the point, and break the habit! (Well,
mostly.)

I think one way to get the person past their pat answers (whether in
rubric form, or "name of the disease", or psychologizing, or
whatever!!!) is just to keep asking them to describe--"Paint it up for
me!" as one of my teachers used to say! Keep asking why; keep asking
"what did that ____ feel like", or "What happened then?" etc., etc.,
etc.! It's much more FUN doing a case that way anyway--well maybe not
exactly fun... But it's richer, more absorbing, a much deeper
experience. Some people need to be urged and taught to really speak
from their experience (heart, gut, sensation) rather than from their
head; other people are primed and ready to go, needing only an
invitation.

Well, then we have the challenge of turning that rich, full description
into an appropriate set of rubrics! But in any case I think *that* is
the cure for "rubric speak", and is in any case (IMO) an important key
to a fully taken case. At least that's the way I learned, and
was I think a huge part of the reason that I fell so much in love with
the process of homeopathy!

And oh yeah, another thing you have to convince them of--"a little
knowledge is a dangerous thing"; many remedies have many facets, and
people needing the same remedy might be *very* different, both from
each other and also from descriptions of the "typical" picture of the
remedy... Sometimes it is genuinely useful to ask them, will they
agree to *not* be told the remedy, at least for the first few weeks,
but you promise you *will* tell them what it was...

Eric, it sounds like an unnerving experience for her, but to be fair...
Sometimes it does take more than a single visit to really understand
a person, get to know who they are, what makes them tick. We can
*hope* that, had she stuck with one or the other, an appointment or two
down the road, they would have been seeing her more clearly, and
prescribing more accurately!
Shannon

Hi, Shannon,
The methods you describe to "tame" the patient back to
patient-mode are fantastic. I've instinctively used
most of them when such cases arise. In the end, it's
not so hard to see the humour in the situation.

"Sometimes it is genuinely useful to ask them, will
they agree to *not* be told the remedy, at least for
the first few weeks, but you promise you *will* tell
them what it was..."

I don't think that I'd feel comfortable asking anyone
to do that.
Sure, these half-informed patients can be a little
difficult to treat at first... but I'm a firm believer
in the fact that nobody knows more about the patient
than the patient himself (except in some deep mental
pathology cases, off course). And I'd feel that, by
"hiding" the remedy's name I'd be doing the equivalent
of feeding someone scrambled eggs, to later on inform
them I've put cow brains in the mix...
What if the patient disagrees with the remedy I've
given him/her? I think it's a delicate issue. I could
almost see it as interfering in their freedom to
decide whether they wanted to take it or not -even if
they agreed to remain ignorant at first.
Hopefully the rx would be perfectly accurate and the
person would be thrilled no matter what... but I guess
the dilemma is more philosophical than practical to
me. It's a matter of ethics.

"Eric, it sounds like an unnerving experience for her,
but to be fair... Sometimes it does take more than a
single visit to really understand a person, get to
know who they are, what makes them tick. We can
*hope* that, had she stuck with one or the other, an
appointment or two down the road, they would have been
seeing her more clearly, and prescribing more
accurately!"

Absolutely. In most cases, that's that and there's no
going around it. But in the case I mentioned it's
absolutely impossible in my opinion that the remedy
could have been correct. I'm with the patient 100% on
this one. Even if a second appointment is needed many
times to see patients more clearly, there's NO WAY
that, being a good homeopath, this person could have
suggested that remedy. As a matter of fact, I was able
to figure out why the rx was such... And I must admit
it makes me angry. Only the poorest case-taking and
real close-mindedness can lead to mistakes like that
one.

I just wish my friend lost the fear of homeopathy.
She's currently reading through every MM on the remedy
that I suggested to make sure it's ok for her to take
it
And that's her choice. It's her right as a patient to
do so.

Thanks for the interesting insights:-)
Take care,
Eric.
--- Robert & Shannon Nelson
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