A practical guide to homeopathic prescribing in acute illnesses and emergencies.
Dr Alok Pareek runs a homeopathic hospital with fifty beds together with his father R S Pareek in Agra, India, treating around two hundred patients daily. His clinical practice spans thirty years. This extensive experience has given him a wealth of opportunities to carry out and refine homeopathic treatment in a wide range of acute and emergency situations.
Based on this experience, the book offers a clear, practical guide to successful clinical prescribing, with case examples and a living materia medica for problems relating to: the heart and circulation; neurological and psychiatric emergencies; acute trauma, injury and pain; surgery; adverse drug reactions; and selected organ specifics. Careful attention is paid to basic principles, including the limitations of homeopathy. Practical therapeutics are described for over one hundred remedies and detailed advice is given throughout on potency, dosage and remedy administration.
Dr Pareek demonstrates that homeopathy has much to offer in acute and emergency settings. He aims to increase the confidence of practitioners, to improve results and encourage them to offer safe and effective treatment in this important field, enabling homeopathy to take its place alongside conventional approaches within mainstream medicine.
Review by Francis Freuherz:
I have been very impressed by this book, as I was by RS Pareek when I heard him lecture in Bombay in 1986 (1) . It is important to note what this book is not, it is not a first aid book for patients to look after themselves. It is a serious work to share clinical experiences of a father and son and extended family, who have their own hospital specialising in emergency surgical and medical care in Agra, not far from the Taj Mahal. This is truly another Indian wonder.
That homeopathy is effective in acute care of patients I can attest, not least from 16 years of acute care on the telephone, 2 or 3 days each week, quite apart from acute prescribing in my own practice. The practical experience shared in this book goes much further and describes a partnership in serious ‘A & E’ care between regular and homeopathic medicine and surgery. The limits of each are described in detail. There are special chapters on cardiac and circulatory emergencies; neurological emergencies such as stroke, intra-cerebral haemorrhage, epilepsy, transient ischaemic attack; and more on psychiatry, trauma and injury, post-operative care including iatrogenic emergencies, oncology, alcoholism, environmental disasters such as industrial pollution, pernicious anaemia and more. Always there is respect shown for the necessary medical and surgical care given, homeopathy may be in some cases the primary therapy but in others the alternative philosophy to which we adhere creates a complementary service.
In addition to decades of clinical experience, what the authors share are some brilliant case histories with just enough clinical detail, and then a differential materia medica of possible medicines in each case. You can see for yourself with this reading excerpt . At the end of the book there are useful cross-references and summary materia medica. The book is well produced but carries some American English spellings, which is not usual from Narayana.
I have some suggestions for the next volume: atrial fibrillation, pulmonary embolisms, diabetic emergencies – both type 1 and type 2, male and female emergencies such as testicular torsion, or after amateur terminations, and appendicitis. To have our own emergency hospital in Britain is something to which we can aspire with messianic hope.
(1) Indian oddities – a traveller’s tale, in The Homeopath, 1986 6:2.
Published in Similia - The Australian Journal of Homoeopathic Medicine - December 2013 written by Nick Goodman
This book is the product of 86 years of experience shared between father and son, some of which has been with homoeopathy in a 50-bed hospital in Agra India, and typically seeing 200 outpatients per day. They have an Intensive Care Unit, and interestingly report that homoeopathic medicine seems to be more effective given by mouth than by intravenous route in unconscious patients (and can be effective if placed in cotton-wool and rubbed behind an ear).
It is encouraging that the authors support the use of conventional diagnostic systems and life saving procedures. Indeed they emphasise that life must be prolonged and stabilised in the more urgent cases by any means available, before one has time to consider an appropriate homoeopathic medicine. Therefore the assistance of relevant specialists, e.g. emergency physician, cardiologist, surgeon, should be sought without delay. The reality of medical services in Australia means that these urgent cases rarely come into the care of a homoeopath, which currently limits the usefulness of this book in this country.
Chapters share their experience in managing a variety of emergencies. I’ll summarise each:
Cardiac and Circulatory - a D/D of medicines that may be useful while waiting for the ambulance, and the medicines (mostly herbals) that can be useful for stabilised heart conditions. Unfortunately there is no comparison provided with current standard medical care. A few medicines are noted for acute hypertension, for which Glonoine has been the most useful. A D/D is provided for acute haemorrhage, and a couple of cases of GIT bleeds are related.
Neurological - Some medicines and case examples of stroke are discussed. This is a clinical setting where homoeopaths may occasionally be called by relatives to assist. The clinical information noted here could be useful. They provide a very limited D/D of epilepsy medicines, and others for head and spinal injuries.
Psychiatric - The discussion of medicines for fear and depression is rather rudimentary, useful are the suggestions for acute mania and rape and fainting (from emotional causes).
Trauma, burns, electric shock, animal bites and bedsores appear to be well covered.
Complications from surgery - indications for a few medicines are noted for the side effects of anaesthesia and options for infection, adhesions and scarring. Also provided are suggestions for phantom limb and stump neuroma, and irritation following endoscopy and extubation of gastric tube or bladder catheter.
Eighteen medicines are discussed for the management of acute pains with the statement that ‘If you master the following medicines you can become confident in the treatment of pain.’ Six medicines for the itching of herpes zoster are also noted.
D/D of medicines useful in appendicitis, pancreatitis, acute renal failure, and a few problems associated with cancer management could provide some useful guidance.
A few suggestions and cases are provided in regard to managing the effects of environmental toxins and Sulphurosum acidum 30C and 200C are suggested in a variety of respiratory cases.
There are eleven pages summarising information and recommended potencies for some of the medicines noted through the book, and a clinical repertory and medicine index is also provided.
The authors wish to focus attention on the utility of homoeopathy in acute conditions, and that there is much more to its use than ’constitutional’ prescribing for chronic conditions. Although their use of brief case histories and a sense of their experience flows compellingly over the text, it is unclear in many sections how reliable this information is for the handling of the case load, in comparison to the response to management in an allopathic hospital. Deciding which patients to refer on requires a good understanding of the therapeutic potential of accessible facilities, as well as one’s own limitations. Ongoing communication and education about what ‘the others’ are doing can be important in getting that balance correct.
