Re: What is the scientific basis for homeopathy

Like Kay, I was a true disbeliever in homeopathy when I started. In fact, I decided that I would end all doubt of the hocus pocus and downed an entire blue bottle of pellets. Mmmm. crunchy and sweet. Three days later, I still had an occipital headache so bad I couldn’t think straight. I looked up the remedy, and the doggone thing had occipital headache as a keynote. Since then I’ve seen croup clear up in an hour, mastitis disappear overnight, and sciatic pain clear up the next day, never to recur. Obviously, the placebo effect. Except if you check your cochrane database from medline, the placebo effect, as defined by an effect from a sugar pill, does not exist.

(Cochrane Database Syst Rev 2003;(1):CD003974)

But we can all agree that a “placebo effect,”” caused by an excellent doctor/patient relationship, exists. But will that actually prevent something like say, acute lethal diarrhea? How about comatose patients, and infants. In my experience, even though I continue to have excellent patient relations, if I give the wrong remedy nothing happens. Right remedy, good things happen. How does it work? No idea. Lots of hand waving. While we’re at it, 80% of standard medicine has no reseach basis. We don’t really know how aspirin works. Not my job. My job is getting people better. I’ve also got 39 pages of research on magnets. Write me.