More Fun with Homeopath Dana Ullman, MPH(!)

[MRC_Hans]

I'm wondering why Dana keeps saying "take off the blinders" (I assume he means blinkers) when he has shown nothing that has impressed anyone, and yet at the same time he himself is constantly ignoring all the very serious objections to his viewpoint which are being constantly put in front of him.*snip*
It is called projection. I'm sure we are all guilty of it, but homeopaths seem to live by it. You are somehow aware of your own vices, but instead of addressing them, you project them onto the opposition.

So they ask us to take off the blinders (or whatever), while they keep their own eyes firmly shut to all the evidence that is unpleasant for them.

They accuse us of intellectual dishonesty while weaving, dodging, and ignoring straight questions.

They ask us to "think outside the box" while totally refusing to even consider the possibility that they could be wrong.

They ask us to study, while they remain wilfully ignorant of even simple concepts like physics and statistics.

They ask us to try remedies, while flatly refusing to make a blinded test themselves.

Etc.

Sad, really.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

I'm sorry, manioberoi, this was originally only meant for JG, but you are now talking so much nonsense, that I can't both be diplomatic, and address it too, so let's talk straight (you are welcome to do the same, I can take it):


A proving can not be replicated - because a proving is not cut and dried as a conventional medicine trial is.

This goes directly against conventinal homeopathic doctrine. Hahnemann says (Organon of Medicine, version6. My emphasis):


§ 32

But it is quite otherwise with the artificial morbific agents which we term medicines. Every real medicine, namely, acts at all times, under all circumstances, on every living human being, and produces in him its peculiar symptoms (distinctly perceptible, if the dose be large enough), so that evidently every living human organism is liable to be affected, and, as it were, inoculated with the medicinal disease at all times, and absolutely (unconditionally), which, as before said, is by no means the case with the natural diseases.


Are you constructing your private version of homeopathy, or are you just making smoke to get around the unpleasant question of testing?


I can see now why some would find it extremely hard to believe that homeopathy works.

Only now? Well certainly, your explanations don't help any. What you are essentially describing is a totally random function. I think that is even unfair to homeopathy; while it is based on faulty reasoning, homeopathy is quite systematic and retains a good inner logic.

I really think you are doing your case a great disfavor.



They are looking for conventional medical answers from a homeopathic medicine - that is most of the time not a medicine as such (in terms of physical molecules) - it is a mere device (a black box) which signals the release of a mechanism (another black box) which leads to either:

-a cure,
-a suppression,
-an aggravation or
-no effect whatsoever;

and which of these will actually occur can not be foretold with any degree of certainty in advance.


So you are saying that, even after taking the case and carefully selecting a remedy, the outcome of homeopathic treatment is totally unpredictable. How does this result differ from not giving any treatment at all?


The homeopath is required to soldier on with the next and the next and the next & c remedy - good homeopaths hit on the right remedy in 1 or 2 attempts, others may even require 9 to 10 attempts to hit on the right remedy - oh! and more than one right remedies would be required. Which of the diseases of the set of diseases repertorised will be cured first and which last can also not be foretold.

Nevertheless the overall health would improve and pathologies will fall off one by one over 3 to 6 months, at times longer.


Isn't this exactly what will also happen, if you give no treatment at all? After all, the human body has the ability to, sooner or later, rid itself of most diseases, given enough time.



Let me clarify that I am NOT a proponent of homeopathy per se - rather I am a proponent of ALL systems of healthcare that can justify the confidence of the public in their ability to cure.


Fervently defending homeopathy is a strange action for one who claims not to be a proponent, but let that rest. I am also a proponent of ALL systems that can justify the confidence in their ability to cure.

So, how do you suggest that homeopathy commences to justify the confidence that some people have in it?


A homeopathic proving can NOT be replicated - see my earlier posts. It would be impossible.


Hahnemann, and most homeopaths I have met disagree with you. However, if it is indeed so, then how do you select a similum?


Let me once again clarify that I am NOT a proponent of homeopathy per se - rather I am a proponent of ALL systems of healthcare that can justify the confidence of the public in their ability to cure.

You know, your posts are quite wordy enough even without you writing things twice :rolleyes:.


If I were to meet with a serious accident I would be foolish to seek homeopathic treatment (other than as a supplementary support) - conventional medicine is the way to go.

I agree. And even not as a supplementary support.


But for cancer (except certain cancers where conventional medicine has exhibited very high percentage of cures - not 5 or 10 years of deathly survival but CURE) I would ordinarily seek out homeopathic cure (sorry, treatment) alongwith naturopathy, ayurveda & c - certainly NOT some of the chemotherapy treatments having poor cure rates); also depending on the specifics, some radiation therapy, gene therapy whenever it is approved.


Where is the documentation for the efficacy of the alternative methods you mention? You know, how do they justify your conficence in them ;)?

First and foremost most people resort in the first instance to conventional medicine - very few to ALL other systems.

Well, yes. Most people are not dumb.


Homeopathy is the most sought after next only to systems recognised by conventional medicine - this when 99 percent of those seeking the homeopathic treatment have no idea WHATSOEVER how it works - some homeopaths have some ideas, but are not in a position to prove it.

So when a homeopath is saying "this works", but cannot support it with evidence, then how is that different from lying?


Neither do most of them attempt to explain how it works and mostly do not reveal the name of the remedy. Normally people turn to homeopathy only when they find no relief (or even worsening due to toxicity) with the conventional drugs.


Yes, when desperate enough, some people will try anything. Tell me, do you think it is alright to sell desperate people something you cannot prove works (and the effect of which, by your own admission above, is indistinguishable from randomness)?


Having said that I REPEAT that homeopathy works. Two "anecdotal" instances:

*snip*

There are many more such cases - they would also be discounted on grounds of "anecdotal" or for being published in some "obscure" journal of complementary, alternate & c medicine.


No reason to put anecdotical in quotation marks, because that is the proper term. Do I need to explain to you, again, why anecdotical accounts have no proof value?

There certainly are homeopaths who do not believe that homeopathic remedies work and so cases of giving conventional drugs would obviously be found off and on. This in no way detracts from the efficacy of homeopathy in the right hands and for the right purposes.

Well, you are right. The fact that some irresponsible quacks practice homeopathy does not, in itself, detract from homeopathy. However, since you admit that results are totally unpredictable, please tell me, how do a patient distinguish between a quack and a responsible homeopath?


Just for the record the WATER POTENCIES work much much better than the SUGAR PILLS, so if any serious trials are carried out this be kept in view.


How do you know this? Manioberoi, you just told us that provings cannot be replicated, and that treatment results cannot be predicted. Then how can you know that water potencies work better than sugar pills?

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

It is different from random because there is at any point in time a finite set of symptoms associated with the one remedy that is prescribed at one time -
Now you are contradicting your self. You earlier said, twice for emphasis, even, that a proving cannot be replicated.

Now, either there is a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy, in which case a proving can obviously be replicated,

or,

a proving cannot be replicated, in which case there cannot be a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy.

Please make up you mind, which is it? You can't have both.

Hans

[kieran]

A proving can not be replicated - because a proving is not cut and dried as a conventional medicine trial is.

I can see now why some would find it extremely hard to believe that homeopathy works.

There you go again ... making up your own little obstacles without ever thinking about why you need to do that.

What is wrong with the protocols that do not require a proving to be replicated? i.e. those that blindly and randomly replace the homoeopathic "remedy" with a placebo to see if there is actually a tangeable effect caused by the "remedy" or not.

They are looking for conventional medical answers from a homeopathic medicine
No - and please stop inventing obstacles - we are looking for any indication that there is actually an effect caused by the homoeopathic "remedy". The ideas we are proposing are not "conventional" medicine - they are plain common sense. Feel free to apply it to baking, housework, car construction, whatever you like. If you try something and you think it was good or bad, we think that you should investigate further to find out the truth before you waste your time with what might be a pointless ritual.

- that is most of the time not a medicine as such (in terms of physical molecules) - it is a mere device (a black box) which signals the release of a mechanism (another black box) which leads to either:
-a cure,
-a suppression,
-an aggravation or
-no effect whatsoever;
and which of these will actually occur can not be foretold with any degree of certainty in advance.

How typically convenient for you - all you are saying is that this is untestable ... please think about why you have to cling to this defense or better still, tell us how it could be tested instead of just moaning about our ideas.


The homeopath is required to soldier on with the next and the next and the next & c remedy - good homeopaths hit on the right remedy in 1 or 2 attempts, others may even require 9 to 10 attempts to hit on the right remedy - oh! and more than one right remedies would be required. Which of the diseases of the set of diseases repertorised will be cured first and which last can also not be foretold.

Nevertheless the overall health would improve and pathologies will fall off one by one over 3 to 6 months, at times longer.

Again - why can't we just blindly and randomly replace the "remedy" with a placebo in these situations and see if there is actually any effect whatsoever caused by the "remedy" in this whole process/charade?

A homeopathic proving can NOT be replicated - see my earlier posts. It would be impossible.

Since you re-stated this, I'll restate: why do you have to keep inventing obstacles? Why don't you actually want to know beyond doubt if this works or not.

Having said that I REPEAT that homeopathy works. Two "anecdotal" instances:[
You know how much credibility is attached to anecdotes here - why did you even bother?

REPEATing that homoeopathy works does not make it so. Why do you steadfastly refuse to condone any form of test that tries to see if there really is any difference over placebo?

[Mojo]

So you are saying that, even after taking the case and carefully selecting a remedy, the outcome of homeopathic treatment is totally unpredictable. How does this result differ from not giving any treatment at all?The difference is in point 3 of the plan:


Collect Symptoms
???
Profit!

[Mojo]

They are looking for conventional medical answers from a homeopathic medicine - that is most of the time not a medicine as such (in terms of physical molecules) - it is a mere device (a black box) which signals the release of a mechanism (another black box) which leads to either:

-a cure,
-a suppression,
-an aggravation or
-no effect whatsoever;

and which of these will actually occur can not be foretold with any degree of certainty in advance.


Post hoc ergo propter hoc though, eh? ;)

[kieran]

I have said elsewhere that the present protocols for conventional medicine are not suited for homeopathic trials - also some collaborative efforts are ongoing between CCRH and AIIMS in India wherein homeopaths are being educated on the methodology followed in conventional medicine - as far as I know they are attempting a direct copy (using the ICMR Guidelines designed for conventional medicine directly) - not a good idea in my opinion - but it is a start - if at first, as I expect, the trials throw up some problems, I am sure the two entities will sit together and graduate to find a direct methodology more suited for homeopathic trials (eg not accepting smokers, coffee drinkers, since these substances have high propensity to cancel out the homeopathic effect) and acceptable to the searching scientific mind, (maybe a 6 month homeopathic trial treatment (require to include dietary and exercise control) of 20 to 30 individuals with a common set of lifestyle diseases (eg diabetes with high BP) - where the aggregate percentage of cure results could be set at say 50 percent with at least 20 percent fully cured within 6 months, would count for more than some blind infatuation with placebos and double blinding - I do not see why conventional medicine would have a problem here because a physical test of most homeopathic remedies would show placebo anyway).

What will you prove other than some people got better? Nothing - there will be no indication that this would not have occured without the homoeopathic "remedy". Do you really not understand this vital point? Please answer this question directly and using a yes/no answer as it will indicate to me, and others, whether you are even worth debating with.

I am sorry but I am going to have to insist on my "blind infatuation with placebos and double blinding" here - and you will still have to come up with a reason why it is incompatible with homoeopathy. What is wrong with the 6 month trial you just proposed but with the following very minor tweaks? ...

find twice as many individuals (e.g. 40 to 60)
without the knowledge of the homoeopath or patient, only give half the patients the homoeopathy, and the rest a placebo
compare the results for the two halves to see if there is really any difference

This is basically your trial, with another one conducted alongside it (although no-one will know in advance what trial they are in). When you look back at the results, the (approximately) half of the people that were given the homoeopathic "remedy" constitute the exactly protocol you described above - I haven't really interefered with your experiment in any way, shape or form. However, the other half of the people are now are very useful comparison to see what the true effect of homoeopathy really is. How many of those showed signs of improvement? That is the vital piece of information you don't seem to care about. If homoeopathy works, then there should be a difference here. If homoeopathy doesn't work then you have something to hide so it is in your best interest not to even attempt to measure any such difference ... ;)

How would the presence of the additional steps in my protocol prevent the half of the people that, in fact, exactly followed your protocol from not conclusively demonstrating the beneficial effects of homoeopathy over placebo???

Why does blinding and control have to prevent homoeopathy working? Why do you cling to your obstacles? I still don't believe you are actually interested in finding out the truth here.

[MRC_Hans]

I have said elsewhere that the present protocols for conventional medicine are not suited for homeopathic trials -

You havesaid that, but you have not given a good explanation. All your reservations have been countered, but you still reject it. Why?

also some collaborative efforts are ongoing between CCRH and AIIMS in India wherein homeopaths are being educated on the methodology followed in conventional medicine - as far as I know they are attempting a direct copy (using the ICMR Guidelines designed for conventional medicine directly) - not a good idea in my opinion - but it is a start - if at first, as I expect, the trials throw up some problems,

I think the only proble they will throw up is that they will show no effect. Why exactly do you consider this a problem? (I know why, but I'd like to have it in your own words, please).


I am sure the two entities will sit together and graduate to find a direct methodology more suited for homeopathic trials (eg not accepting smokers, coffee drinkers, since these substances have high propensity to cancel out the homeopathic effect)


How do you know this? You know, you keep making these statments; water potencies are better, coffee is an antidote, but you also claim that homeopathy is next to impossible to test, so how can you know this? How did you find out?

and acceptable to the searching scientific mind, (maybe a 6 month homeopathic trial treatment (require to include dietary and exercise control) of 20 to 30 individuals with a common set of lifestyle diseases (eg diabetes with high BP) - where the aggregate percentage of cure results could be set at say 50 percent with at least 20 percent fully cured within 6 months, would count for more than some blind infatuation with placebos and double blinding - I do not see why conventional medicine would have a problem here because a physical test of most homeopathic remedies would show placebo anyway).

Since diabetes with high BP will repond excellently to diet and exercise, placebo control (and, of course, blinding) would be essential. I would not be surprised at all to see 20% of the patient becoming symptom-free with proper diet and exercise alone, and certainly at least 50% would show marked improvement.

.. So if you are suggesting such a trial, but without placebo control you are really setting up a trial where you hope to make homeopathy take the credit for the expected effect concurrent lifestyle mangement. That, my friend, is called cheating.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

That was a very important question. It does require a more detailed explanation

A proving is conducted with a remedy on a set of provers. The symptoms revealed are a function of:

-the remedy
-the potency of the remedy
-the environment
-the prover

While the first two are generally functions that would cause repeat symptoms, it is entirely a different matter when it comes to the last two - they are variable and hence the variation in the symptoms.

Next objection was that this is too random a system to be workable.

Yes, but in aggregating the random systems we are actually building up what is called the remedy picture - a full picture would require every person on earth to be proved in all environments- when we prove 10 in environment 'A' - a partial picture is built up - then later we prove 20 in environment 'B' - a more comprehensive picture is built up - this gives rise to the oft heard "well proven remedy" - it means simply that large number of provings have been conducted on the remedy.

More provings mean less chaos and more order - not more chaos as some of you thought.

Apart from this (as I already said) being contrary to normal homeopathic doctrine, you have also dismantled your own claim about a proving being not repeatable. You explanation above clearly shows that a proving IS repeatable, provided you use the same prover and the same environment.

Whether or not your claimed variables are valid, there is a way to deal with variables: Simply keep them constant. So, in your scenario above, we can see the proper protocol for a sound test: Let the same persons, in the same environment do the test, but vary the remedy (between remedy and placebo), and if the remedy is different from placebo, this wil lbe visible. This is called a cross-over test.

Thank you.

... Next smoke-screen, please! Seems we dispersed this one ;).

Hans

[Capsid]

Why can't homoeopaths think logically or even exercise a little critical thinking? Is it a smoke screen or is there a general failure to think things though?

[Mojo]

Why does blinding and control have to prevent homoeopathy working?


Quantum entanglement (http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/4/1/7)! ;)

[fls]

A proving can not be replicated - because a proving is not cut and dried as a conventional medicine trial is.

You are operating under a misconception. Conventional medicine is not cut and dried, but is subject to the same kind of confounding, variability, vagueness, and randomness that you describe for homeopathy. Every reason you have given for why homeopathy cannot be tested applies to conventional medicine. Through hard work and persistence, we have figured out ways to overcome these problems and extract useful information, thereby advancing the practise of medicine. Taking refuge in pessimism and Just-So stories is hardly justifiable under those circumstances.

Linda

[fls]

Manioberoi,

You are stating that you would use homeopathy if you had cancer. Please let me know if I do not understand this correctly.

If you adopt the use of homeopathy (plus or minus any other treatment modalities you consider useful) when faced with the manifestations of illness (in this case, manifestations brought about in relation to cancer) you expect to be better off than if the use of homeopathy was excluded, correct? And this applies not only to yourself, but to others as well, correct? And if, unbeknowst to yourself or the homeopathic practioner who was helping you, a particular supplier of homeopathic medicines was dishonest and was not actually succussing the water with the specified substance, the people who received treatment based on medicine received from that supplier, would not receive the full benefits of homeopathy, correct?

If this is not correct, please elaborate so that I can understand. I do already understand that the expected results are highly individual, and that the process will also be highly individual.

Linda

[fls]

I have said elsewhere that the present protocols for conventional medicine are not suited for homeopathic trials - also some collaborative efforts are ongoing between CCRH and AIIMS in India wherein homeopaths are being educated on the methodology followed in conventional medicine - as far as I know they are attempting a direct copy (using the ICMR Guidelines designed for conventional medicine directly) - not a good idea in my opinion - but it is a start - if at first, as I expect, the trials throw up some problems, I am sure the two entities will sit together and graduate to find a direct methodology more suited for homeopathic trials (eg not accepting smokers, coffee drinkers, since these substances have high propensity to cancel out the homeopathic effect) and acceptable to the searching scientific mind, (maybe a 6 month homeopathic trial treatment (require to include dietary and exercise control) of 20 to 30 individuals with a common set of lifestyle diseases (eg diabetes with high BP) - where the aggregate percentage of cure results could be set at say 50 percent with at least 20 percent fully cured within 6 months, would count for more than some blind infatuation with placebos and double blinding - I do not see why conventional medicine would have a problem here because a physical test of most homeopathic remedies would show placebo anyway).

Would you have any problem with this trial - would it be an acceptable test to you (i.e. would you consider the results valid even if nobody was cured within 6 months)?

If so, what if you found out that someone got the medicines mixed up and so some people got the wrong stuff, or received blanks? Would you expect that to interfere with improvement?

Linda

[manioberoi]

Manioberoi,

You are stating that you would use homeopathy if you had cancer. Please let me know if I do not understand this correctly.

If you adopt the use of homeopathy (plus or minus any other treatment modalities you consider useful) when faced with the manifestations of illness (in this case, manifestations brought about in relation to cancer) you expect to be better off than if the use of homeopathy was excluded, correct? And this applies not only to yourself, but to others as well, correct? And if, unbeknowst to yourself or the homeopathic practioner who was helping you, a particular supplier of homeopathic medicines was dishonest and was not actually succussing the water with the specified substance, the people who received treatment based on medicine received from that supplier, would not receive the full benefits of homeopathy, correct?

If this is not correct, please elaborate so that I can understand. I do already understand that the expected results are highly individual, and that the process will also be highly individual.

Linda
Some homeopathic pharmacies enjoy higher reputations than others. Sometimes accidental exposure to sunlight / radiation may cause problems. Also there are more than one protocols / methods in use and full standardisation has not been achieved so far.

To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.

[Professor Yaffle]

But how do you know if it was the wrong remedy, or if it was the right remedy that had problems causing it not to work?

[Oualawouzou]

Given all the ways you have listed that homeopathy can fail... what makes you think homeopathy works at all? :confused:

[krazyKemist]

Quantum entanglement (http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/4/1/7)! ;)

...kind of quantum superposition between the remedy and the placebo.

Yeah... Quantum physics is kinda complicated innit ? Absolutely blibbering. What did somebody said about people using quantum physics beyond the atomic level ?

the Kemist

[Mojo]

To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.


If remedies are expected to act in a particular way, then this can be tested for.

[manioberoi]

Would you have any problem with this trial - would it be an acceptable test to you (i.e. would you consider the results valid even if nobody was cured within 6 months)?

If so, what if you found out that someone got the medicines mixed up and so some people got the wrong stuff, or received blanks? Would you expect that to interfere with improvement?

Linda
If the remedies (remember that in this example the homeopath is free to prescribe any one or more of over 6000 remedies) are carefully sourced, and trials are properly controlled no mixing up should be possible. There might be slight delay or even non-availability of an odd remedy here and there, which should not ordinarily detract from the intrinsic value of the overall trial outcome.

I was awaiting the valuable comments of JJM. However seems to be busy elsewhere.

As regards the rtial krazyKemist(498), kieran (507) and Hans (509) have suggested the basis for what I feel may be a highly workable plan of action for a homeopathic double blind trial.

Do you agree with all that they have suggested?

[kieran]

Sometimes accidental exposure to sunlight / radiation may cause problems.
It is very interesting to see that you use the word may here? How would you find out if such exposures did or didn't have an effect? (Clue: you could try with and without such exposures and look for a difference ... maybe you could even put in steps to avoid any bias by blinding the process ...) :rolleyes:

Have you any proof for these possible claims or are you just adding to your list of obstacles in the hope we will get bored? Why do you have to keep coming up with excuses/obstacles? Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?:boggled:

[manioberoi]

If remedies are expected to act in a particular way, then this can be tested for.
If you mean chemically - NO - if you mean by observing symptoms - that requires a discussion.

[manioberoi]

It is very interesting to see that you use the word may here? How would you find out if such exposures did or didn't have an effect? (Clue: you could try with and without such exposures and look for a difference ... maybe you could even put in steps to avoid any bias by blinding the process ...) :rolleyes:

Have you any proof for these possible claims or are you just adding to your list of obstacles in the hope we will get bored? Why do you have to keep coming up with excuses/obstacles? Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?:boggled:
I have to say "MAY" because:

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.

It is only anecdotal experience of homeopaths that if exposed to EXCESSIVE sunlight or radiation the remedies seem to lose their effectiveness.

Other homeopaths have reported that the Xray screening of baggage does not seem to cause the remedies to lose their effectiveness to any perceptible degree.

A careful homeopath stores her remedies in a cool dry environment away from sources of electromagnetic energy, sunlight & c.

This is considered good homeopathic practice.

Somebody on this list asked about PILLS and WATER POTENCY.

PILLS can be dissolved in water to obtain water potency - water potency can also be obtained by liquid (alcohol based) potency dissolved in water.

While PILLS are Fourth Organon water potency relates to Sixth Organon which is considered superior by classical homeopaths.

[manioberoi]

It is very interesting to see that you use the word may here? How would you find out if such exposures did or didn't have an effect? (Clue: you could try with and without such exposures and look for a difference ... maybe you could even put in steps to avoid any bias by blinding the process ...) :rolleyes:

Have you any proof for these possible claims or are you just adding to your list of obstacles in the hope we will get bored? Why do you have to keep coming up with excuses/obstacles? Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?:boggled:
As regards "Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?" kindly refer to my post 520.

Do you agree with krazyKemist(498) and Hans (509) ?

[Oualawouzou]

I have to say "MAY" because:

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.

It is only anecdotal experience of homeopaths that if exposed to EXCESSIVE sunlight or radiation the remedies seem to lose their effectiveness.

Other homeopaths have reported that the Xray screening of baggage does not seem to cause the remedies to lose their effectiveness to any perceptible degree.


You do realize this can be tested for, right? (ETA: just like you can test weither or not prayer helps in recovery. Or shaking stuffed koalas over sick people. No "molecules" to be analyzed, but the effects of those practices can easily be analyzed, just like the effects of any attempted treatment can be analyzed, regardless of the intricacies of the treatment itself.)

If homeopathic remedies work, then they have an effect on patients. If homeopathic remedies work differently depending on weither or not they have been exposed to, say, sunlight, then they will have different effects on patients.

Two groups. One treated with non-sunlightified remedies. One treated with sunlightified remedies. Compare the results.

That's one of the major points of clinical trials: replace anecdotes with data.

In fact, I'm starting to believe you have absolutely no idea what clinical trials are about and how they differentiate from a guy on the street telling you what happened to his sister-in-law last year.

[Mojo]

If remedies are expected to act in a particular way, then this can be tested for.
If you mean chemically - NO - if you mean by observing symptoms - that requires a discussion.


No, I do not mean tested chemically. I mean tested by observing the apparent effects in groups of patients either given the remedy or a placebo, and seeing if there is a difference between the responses of the two groups. If the remedies produce any effect at all, then this can be tested in this way.

You talked about action to be taken if a remedy does not act "as expected"; if this idea is not total nonsense you must expect the remedy to act in some particular way.

[Mojo]

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.


You claim that homoeopathic remedies have effects: that they can cure disease. This can be tested.

[krazyKemist]

I have to say "MAY" because:

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.

It is only anecdotal experience of homeopaths that if exposed to EXCESSIVE sunlight or radiation the remedies seem to lose their effectiveness.

Other homeopaths have reported that the Xray screening of baggage does not seem to cause the remedies to lose their effectiveness to any perceptible degree.

A careful homeopath stores her remedies in a cool dry environment away from sources of electromagnetic energy, sunlight & c.

This is considered good homeopathic practice.



Ok, peoples... I think we are not phasing properly anymore. This is supposed to be a science discussion, isn't it ? Because science deals with the "physical" world, not about wishful thinking. That's the domain of spiritism and religion. So unless what you want to say is that homeopathy is akin to faith healing, better be back in the "physical" world.

You claim that something has an effect on the body (healing), which is "physical". That effect is "physical", therefore, it can be "physically" measured. No evading here, please.

You claim that a homeopathic remedy is not a placebo. No matter that "physical" testing cannot tell the difference between it and plain water, it is supposed to have a "physical" effect on the body, to produce "physical" differences, ie symptoms or cure, which can be "physically" measured. To prove your claim, you must therefore compare your remedy (your dilution, prepared according to your protocol) with a non-active substance (plain untreated water) as to the "physical" effects they have on the body. The placebo effect, as was mentionned previously, is what happens when :

-people get better by themselves, without intervention
-people believe they are better, without intervention
-people get better, because they believe something will make them better

There is no complete explanation for the placebo effect, but clinical testers know of it and have learned to take it into account with double-blinding. Double blinding keeps the patient from knowing which substance he receives (so as to eliminate the effect of the belief he can have or not in the cure working) and the experimenter (so as to eliminate the effect of the desire of the experimenter to see his experiment successful, and the effect that can have on the reporting of results, and of course, accidental or purposeful transfer of the information to the patient).

When you gather results that way, and examine them using statistics, then you can truly know if something is working or not. No middle ground.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

Ok, peoples... I think we are not phasing properly anymore. This is supposed to be a science discussion, isn't it ? Because science deals with the "physical" world, not about wishful thinking. That's the domain of spiritism and religion. So unless what you want to say is that homeopathy is akin to faith healing, better be back in the "physical" world.

You claim that something has an effect on the body (healing), which is "physical". That effect is "physical", therefore, it can be "physically" measured. No evading here, please.

You claim that a homeopathic remedy is not a placebo. No matter that "physical" testing cannot tell the difference between it and plain water, it is supposed to have a "physical" effect on the body, to produce "physical" differences, ie symptoms or cure, which can be "physically" measured. To prove your claim, you must therefore compare your remedy (your dilution, prepared according to your protocol) with a non-active substance (plain untreated water) as to the "physical" effects they have on the body. The placebo effect, as was mentionned previously, is what happens when :

-people get better by themselves, without intervention
-people believe they are better, without intervention
-people get better, because they believe something will make them better

There is no complete explanation for the placebo effect, but clinical testers know of it and have learned to take it into account with double-blinding. Double blinding keeps the patient from knowing which substance he receives (so as to eliminate the effect of the belief he can have or not in the cure working) and the experimenter (so as to eliminate the effect of the desire of the experimenter to see his experiment successful, and the effect that can have on the reporting of results, and of course, accidental or purposeful transfer of the information to the patient).

When you gather results that way, and examine them using statistics, then you can truly know if something is working or not. No middle ground.

the Kemist
I would have to request you, kieran and Hans to stand by what you have stated earlier , QUOTE:

"krazyKemist #498
Ok, as long as the placebo group does not accept smokers and coffee drinkers too. Both groups have to be homogenized. Meaning having similar composition. And, the "infatuation" conventional medicine has with double-blinding is due to the placebo effect itself, the way people have of getting cured simply because they believe something is curing them. So to prove the claim that homeopathy has any effect at all, that it is not the placebo effect alone acting, there must be a placebo group, double-blinded. This is not about convincing us that something is a placebo with a physical test, but rather that a homeopathic remedy is not a placebo !

the Kemist"


"kieran #507
What will you prove other than some people got better? Nothing - there will be no indication that this would not have occured without the homoeopathic "remedy". Do you really not understand this vital point? Please answer this question directly and using a yes/no answer as it will indicate to me, and others, whether you are even worth debating with.

I am sorry but I am going to have to insist on my "blind infatuation with placebos and double blinding" here - and you will still have to come up with a reason why it is incompatible with homoeopathy. What is wrong with the 6 month trial you just proposed but with the following very minor tweaks? ...
find twice as many individuals (e.g. 40 to 60)
without the knowledge of the homoeopath or patient, only give half the patients the homoeopathy, and the rest a placebo
compare the results for the two halves to see if there is really any difference
This is basically your trial, with another one conducted alongside it (although no-one will know in advance what trial they are in). When you look back at the results, the (approximately) half of the people that were given the homoeopathic "remedy" constitute the exactly protocol you described above - I haven't really interefered with your experiment in any way, shape or form. However, the other half of the people are now are very useful comparison to see what the true effect of homoeopathy really is. How many of those showed signs of improvement? That is the vital piece of information you don't seem to care about. If homoeopathy works, then there should be a difference here. If homoeopathy doesn't work then you have something to hide so it is in your best interest not to even attempt to measure any such difference ...

How would the presence of the additional steps in my protocol prevent the half of the people that, in fact, exactly followed your protocol from not conclusively demonstrating the beneficial effects of homoeopathy over placebo???

Why does blinding and control have to prevent homoeopathy working? Why do you cling to your obstacles? I still don't believe you are actually interested in finding out the truth here."


"MRC Hans #509
Apart from this (as I already said) being contrary to normal homeopathic doctrine, you have also dismantled your own claim about a proving being not repeatable. You explanation above clearly shows that a proving IS repeatable, provided you use the same prover and the same environment.

Whether or not your claimed variables are valid, there is a way to deal with variables: Simply keep them constant. So, in your scenario above, we can see the proper protocol for a sound test: Let the same persons, in the same environment do the test, but vary the remedy (between remedy and placebo), and if the remedy is different from placebo, this wil lbe visible. This is called a cross-over test.

Thank you.

... Next smoke-screen, please! Seems we dispersed this one .

Hans"

KINDLY CONFIRM.

We may then be able to evolve the discussion further.

[homer]

What does MPH stand for ? More Phony Hopeless ?
Should be MPHB . I leave finding a suitable B to the reader.
There seems to be loads of these letters about , for myself :
PHd(Failed ) MBA(Mighty Big A??e) OBE( Old Badger Eater) NBG( No B Good) .

[Pipirr]

manioberoi, that post is a bit hard to follow because of the formatting. You can use the quote button (second icon from the end in the 'reply' box) to put a comment into a quote box. Just highlight the text in question.

There's also a multiquote function, but I'm not sure how that works....

[SYLVESTER1592]

Some homeopathic pharmacies enjoy higher reputations than others. Sometimes accidental exposure to sunlight / radiation may cause problems. Also there are more than one protocols / methods in use and full standardisation has not been achieved so far.

To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.

This sounds interesting... When you conclude that radiation or sunlight exposure sometimes causes problems, does that mean you have tested for the effects of radiation and sunlight on the effect of the homeopathic solution or is this a hypothesis you are going to test? Have there been tests for the differences in effect of identical solutions made by different manufacturers? Is this another hypothesis that will be tested any time soon?
I think it would make interesting reading material... :D

SYL :)

[fls]

Some homeopathic pharmacies enjoy higher reputations than others. Sometimes accidental exposure to sunlight / radiation may cause problems. Also there are more than one protocols / methods in use and full standardisation has not been achieved so far.

To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.

You did not answer my questions. Does this mean that my understanding was correct?

I was trying to confirm that not getting the right medicine would make a difference - that you would expect those people to react differently, not recover or cause the homeopath to become confused about the correct path to take.

Linda

[fls]

If the remedies (remember that in this example the homeopath is free to prescribe any one or more of over 6000 remedies) are carefully sourced, and trials are properly controlled no mixing up should be possible. There might be slight delay or even non-availability of an odd remedy here and there, which should not ordinarily detract from the intrinsic value of the overall trial outcome.

I was awaiting the valuable comments of JJM. However seems to be busy elsewhere.

As regards the rtial krazyKemist(498), kieran (507) and Hans (509) have suggested the basis for what I feel may be a highly workable plan of action for a homeopathic double blind trial.

Do you agree with all that they have suggested?

You had not replied to Kieran's suggestion, so I did not realize that you found it acceptable. I agree with what Kieran (and KrazyKemist) suggested. Hans' trial would also be useful.

Linda

[krazyKemist]

No problem standing with what I said.

the Kemist

[SYLVESTER1592]

<snip>...
To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.

:D
This is kind of like playing craps. You change the enchantment on the dice, ... You just keep throwing the dice 'till you get a seven. When you do... the therapy worked. When the patient gets impatient or starts to doubt the "therapy", you get rid of them by sending them to us. Is this how it works? Just curious...
If this still is a personalized optimalization of the remedy... Have there been tests of the difference in effect of the manufacturer or the batch used?

SYL :)

[Professor Yaffle]

I also agree that the trials briefly described by the others here seem pretty sound, but i would also add that one single trial like this with a significant result would not be enough on its own. It needs to be reproducable. You need to demonstate the effect several times in order to rule out fluke results.

[Chris Haynes]

...There's also a multiquote function, but I'm not sure how that works....

That is what the button with the double quote button is for on the lower left hand corner. Near the "quote" button.

Hit the double quote button on each post you wish to be quoted in your reply. Then at the bottom of the page hit the "Reply to Thread" button. In a few seconds you will have a reply box with all the quotes in it ready for you to edit.

Now here is a question I would like answered:

One of the miasms that Hahnemann identified was syphilis. We can assume that he treated persons with syphilis, and there is most likely historical data to show how homeopaths have treated syphilis over the last two centuries.

I want to know how effective homeopaths have been in treating syphilis versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis.

manioberoi ... Do you have an answer for that? Give it to me in real numbers. Things like "homeopathy has a XX% success rate with syphilis", and show us where it is documented.

[Delusions_O_Grandeur]

**SMACKS THE EJECT BUTTON** Abandoning thread.

[manioberoi]

You did not answer my questions. Does this mean that my understanding was correct?

I was trying to confirm that not getting the right medicine would make a difference - that you would expect those people to react differently, not recover or cause the homeopath to become confused about the correct path to take.

Linda
You are correct.

[kieran]

As regards "Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?" kindly refer to my post 520.

Do you agree with krazyKemist(498) and Hans (509) ?

Since you asked ... I agree that their proposed protocols are valid ways of determining whether there are particular physical effects caused directly by homoeopathy. I also think my variant is.

[kieran]

I have to say "MAY" because:

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.
As others have said ... you claim physical effect. So yes physical testability.

It is only anecdotal experience of homeopaths that if exposed to EXCESSIVE sunlight or radiation the remedies seem to lose their effectiveness.
Sunlight ... so without any kind of systematic study (if such an effect even existed), you would have no idea if the physical effect is caused by light photons, or by the temperature change ... but you wouldn't care about that would you. Nenermind that you would learn something and have a logical way of improving your preparation and storage methods. Who needs to know eh?;)

[kieran]

If you mean chemically - NO - if you mean by observing symptoms - that requires a discussion.
Not observing symptoms - observing effects ... this includes effects on symptoms.

[kieran]

I have to say "MAY" because:

To start with no physical molecule. So no physical testability.

It is only anecdotal experience of homeopaths that if exposed to EXCESSIVE sunlight or radiation the remedies seem to lose their effectiveness.

I just noticed that while trying to clarify your "MAY", you had to resort to the use of "seem" ... are you actually sure about any of this?!? Or is it considered "good homeopathic practice" to just make it up as you go along?:confused:

While you have been merrily wandering through your own illogical view of the world, you seem to have stated above that no physical testing of homoeopathy is possible ... and yet in your earlier post #520 (the one you explicitly refered me back to read), you came up with the following ...

As regards the rtial krazyKemist(498), kieran (507) and Hans (509) have suggested the basis for what I feel may be a highly workable plan of action for a homeopathic double blind trial.

Please make your mind up - can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?

[manioberoi]

[QUOTE=MRC_Hans;2707775]I'm sorry, manioberoi, this was originally only meant for JG, but you are now talking so much nonsense, that I can't both be diplomatic, and address it too, so let's talk straight (you are welcome to do the same, I can take it):



This goes directly against conventinal homeopathic doctrine. Hahnemann says (Organon of Medicine, version6. My emphasis):



Are you constructing your private version of homeopathy, or are you just making smoke to get around the unpleasant question of testing?




Only now? Well certainly, your explanations don't help any. What you are essentially describing is a totally random function. I think that is even unfair to homeopathy; while it is based on faulty reasoning, homeopathy is quite systematic and retains a good inner logic.

I really think you are doing your case a great disfavor.




So you are saying that, even after taking the case and carefully selecting a remedy, the outcome of homeopathic treatment is totally unpredictable. How does this result differ from not giving any treatment at all?


SNIP
EASILY EXPLAINED:

“opposition of ideas between the paragraph 32, 117, 136 and 138. Hahnemann stipulates: (§32) 'But it is quite otherwise with the the artificial morbific agents which we term medicines. Every real medicine, namely, acts at all times, under all circumstances, on every living human being, and produces in him its peculiar symptoms (distinctly perceptible, if the dose be large enough), so that evidently every human organism is liable to be affected, and, as it were, inoculated with the medicinal disease at all times, and absolutely (unconditionally) which, as before said, is by no means the case with the natural diseases.' (§117) 'To the latter category belong the so-called idiosyncrasies, by which are meant peculiar corporeal constitutions which, although otherwise healthy, possess a disposition to be brought into a more or less morbid state by certain things which seem to produce no impression and no change in many other individuals. But this inability to make an impression on even one is only apparent.' (§136) 'Although, as has been said, a medicine, on being proved on healthy subjects cannot develop in one person all the alterations of health it is capable of causing, but can only do this when given to many different individuals, varying in their corporeal and mental constitution, yet the tendency to excite all these symptoms in every human being exists in it.' (§138) 'All the sufferings, accidents and changes of the health of the experimenter during the action of a medicine (provided the above conditions essential to a good and pure experiment are complied with) are solely derived from this medicine, and must be regarded and registered as belonging peculiarly to this medicine, as symptoms of this medicine, even though the experimenter had observed, a considerable time previously, the spontaneous occurrence of similar phenomena in himself. The reappearance of these during the trial of the medicine only shows that this individual is by virtue of his peculiar constitution, particularly disposed to have such symptoms excited in him. In this case they are the effect of the medicine; the symptoms do not arise spontaneously while the medicine that has been taken is exercising an influence over the health of the whole system, but are produced by the medicine'. According to Hahnemann a remedy elicits symptoms pertaining to its identity, meaning that a proved substance evokes in any prover the same symptomatology. He did not realise, although he talked about specificity (see underline), that susceptibility was an important factor. So, on one side he said (§32) that a remedy brings its own symptomatology in each and every human and on the other side (§117), he said symptoms appear a) frequently in healthy subjects. b) less often in a small number. c) in exceptional circumstances, there is no symptom. This is in direct contradiction with paragraph 32. Paragraph 117 was written to explain this discrepancy and he stated 'that it was only apparent' although his own experimental studies could not favour this point of view. Had nature given him a few decades more to live, no doubt he would have corrected and understood these discrepancies. He would have realised that a substance cannot elicit the same pathogenesis in every human because of their idiosyncrasy and he would have also realised that a remedy has dynamic properties which help to identify its specific characteristic the same way that fingerprints identify a man. He would have noticed that a substance has a dynamic pattern and not a physiological pattern. Then he went on writing the aphorism 138 which is correct, except the conclusion. Instead, he should have started: 'A potentised remedy elicits symptoms peculiar to the tendencies of the subject but their general modalities reproduce the essence of the substance'. Contemporary homeopaths voice their concern about this troubling fact. Sankaran affirms that 'No remedy in homeopathy has a site of action. Potentised remedies have dynamic effect only. Their effect is central. This central disturbances is to be cured in disease, not the pathology'. If so, why do we have Materia Medicae? Why do we have the pathogenesis of the remedies recorded in our book upon which we prescribe? What to cling to? To the pathogenesis and the pharmacology of our remedies (physical matter, low potencies), or to the new philosophies which claim that we have to match the dynamic disturbance of the patient to the dynamic effect of the remedy (mental, metaphysical level, high potencies). Sankaran says: 'A remedy that covers the mental state and general symptoms of a patient has got greater possibility of curing than the one that covers the particulars without covering the mental and general symptoms'. He went on to mention numerous cured cases, and the disease for which the patient was treated was not even mentioned in the Materia Medica!

What to do with our text books?
The Organon is a tool given by Hahnemann. As a good student, it is our aim and desire to improve it, to sharpen it to the need of the day and to bring it to the intellectual level of our time. What the Master could not grasp (because of the enormous flow of data, and because of the historical pressure), we are now able to do (humbly). Masi says that the discrepancy in the Organon stems from the fact that for the first time in life, one man was going from organic effects to dynamic effects and he could not, without leaving his colleagues in the dark, lead them into dynamic comprehension. It was like going into the microscopic world without a microscope, without any foundation for it. One will recognise the genius of Hahnemann in warning his followers not to try to understand the way homeopathy works, as it would lead to a waste of time and may be insanity (who is willing and ready to jump into a dark hole?). The Buddha in his teaching, used the same words and gently warned his disciples to comprehend things from their form and substance and not from our baseless speculation, until we are ready to grasp their content.

Each generation must add its discoveries
Nowadays, we have the means to penetrate what we use to call the 'void'. Science provides us with formulae which confirm the dynamic properties of matter and the Chaos theory suggests that even if we cannot guess what would happen next, there is definitely a common sense to life and a meaning to it. This should definitely help us to accept the idea that our remedies are dynamic and what we need to cure in the patient is not his disease but the disturbance of the vital force which in itself is pure energy. If we try to understand what we call 'peculiar symptoms' in a remedy, we will realise that it is the key to the understanding of this particular remedy. Hahnemann says that all substances are able, in any human being, to elicit symptoms and even in those who do not show any sensitivity to it, there is a reaction although not apparent! He did not realise that, when given in higher potency, the medicine is not going to show its peculiarity as it does with lower potencies on the physical level, regardless of the prover, but is going to bring forward the idiosyncrasy of the person. The substance is going to influence the prover in such a way that; Only his tendencies, his peculiarities, his predisposition will appear. The peculiarity of the remedy being in the description of its dynamic action (see Sherr who, for example, says that Sepia has the feeling of losing something and as a reaction must hold on. This is the essence of the remedy shown on the physical as well as the mental level). If one can grasp this principle, one will have to admit that in our Materia Medica many symptoms are not needed. It is difficult to accept and it requires a radical departure from our intellectual way of understanding the universe. The change will taken place slowly because most of our pharmacopoeia has not been thoroughly proved. We still have to rely on data collated during two hundred years of homeopathy and we still have to speculate upon the few mental symptoms known to us. It means also that we will have to evolve a new Materia Medica, a more dynamic Materia Medica which will present the proper idiosyncrasy of the remedy and not the symptoms arising from peculiar tendencies of the prover (idiosyncrasy). Hence the trend nowadays of extensive provings. They are welcome and the emphasis of these provings should be more on the dynamic symptoms (Sherr), either physical or mental, which clearly identify the substance.

What consideration shall we give to the physical symptoms?
Physical symptoms are very important, but what is important is not whether they can cure such and such a condition, but to know their dynamics. To understand, as we do while studying the mental symptoms, what they mean and how they progress or regress. Physical symptoms will have to be studied: both the tendencies (sycotic, syphilitic) and the particular symptoms will have to be explained, to be understood. Behind their particularity lies the dynamic of the remedy. We have often not been able to explain why a peculiar symptom arises during a proving and how it leads to the core of a remedy. Very few homeopaths have tried to understand it that way. Hahnemann says that we should give importance to peculiar symptoms but he never said that we should not try to understand them. Take Cocculus for example: everybody knows it is a remedy for sea-sickness. What does it mean? To be at sea is to be on an unstable base (unlike being on earth). Cocculus is a person suffering from disorientation because of his incapacity to grasp the meaning of his live. The situation gets worse as soon as the routine is disturbed, e.g. a family member is sick, hence the Fear of sudden events, Anxiety about relatives. This person needs stability in order to survive! Otherwise he finds himself in a state of confusion, dullness (Mind: Indolence, difficulties in face of). We are talking about a lively person who can be overwhelmed by an insult and who never knows whether she has done right or wrong. (Mind: Delusion, crime committed a. Mind: Dreams, crimes). When her life is uneventful, there is exaltation, when difficulties appear there is introspection and a lack of reaction. The Cocculus patient is easily disturbed, easily loses his balance in life (which is translated on the physical level by vertigo). It is not the loss of sleep which brings the disease but the disturbance in itself; the fact of not being able to differentiate between a serious situation which requires proper reaction and an innocuous situation. The pathogenesis of Cocculus presents vertigo, tremors, sensation of hollowness, emptiness, which is the replica of the Cocculus state of mind. This is the dynamic aspect of the remedy, whoever proves it will experience this inability to react to adverse circumstances (be it benign). There is one dynamic, but many ways of expressing it, depending on the provers, and once we understand it, through studies of rigorous provings, we can rely on it to prescribe the remedy, even if the disease we want to cure does not appear in its pathogenesis.

The new approach
If we understand the dynamics of each remedy, we will give ourselves the opportunity to prescribe for those cases classified as acute, or specifics. We will be able to understand the subtle mechanism behind the symptoms, as Clarke said 'but those, whose knowledge of Camphor is confined to its coarser actions, will never understand what a great remedy it is when used according to its fine symptomatic indications and given in the higher potencies'. I am only repeating what others have said before me, and to calm down your rebellious spirits, I must again quote Masi: 'In order to avoid an intellectual or a fundamental confusion, I want to say that we do not deny the fact that the general and characteristic symptoms of a patient can individualise the patient, what we claim is that they do not help us to understand him'. Sankaran went even further in his understanding of remedies and tries to understand them according to their kingdom and miasm, in studying them at the dynamic level, at the level of their action and not at the level of their reaction. I think we should think it over and try to evolve a new Materia Medica based on these facts and cured cases. We have to prove more and more remedies and to study them directly from the collated data, to be able to use the same expression as the provers, to reach the metaphysical level of the drug (Scholten) and to prescribe for the dynamic disturbance and not for the disease.”

[Homoeopathic Links (_Hom_links) 1997 Autumn
Evolution of homoeopathic materia medica based on rigorous provings Patrick Brillant, India]

[manioberoi]

Now you are contradicting your self. You earlier said, twice for emphasis, even, that a proving cannot be replicated.

Now, either there is a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy, in which case a proving can obviously be replicated,

or,

a proving cannot be replicated, in which case there cannot be a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy.

Please make up you mind, which is it? You can't have both.

Hans
"at any point in time"

[manioberoi]

[QUOTE=Hydrogen Cyanide;2709736]That is what the button with the double quote button is for on the lower left hand corner. Near the "quote" button.

Hit the double quote button on each post you wish to be quoted in your reply. Then at the bottom of the page hit the "Reply to Thread" button. In a few seconds you will have a reply box with all the quotes in it ready for you to edit.

Now here is a question I would like answered:

One of the miasms that Hahnemann identified was syphilis. We can assume that he treated persons with syphilis, and there is most likely historical data to show how homeopaths have treated syphilis over the last two centuries.

I want to know how effective homeopaths have been in treating syphilis versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis.



CASE E. E., Some Clinical experiences of E. E. Case (cea1)
Department of homeopathic philosophy
A HOMEOPATHIC TITAN
Royal E. S. Hayes, M.D. , Waterbury, Conn.


"I well remember a case of syphilis which I took to him while yet in the first stage. When he saw it he said: "You cannot cure this at once. You will have to go along with it and shorten it up as you go." I left the case to his control and he gave some remedy or other that brought it out on the skin with great fury. It remained on the skin but changed type rapidly and he followed it up with one remedy after another as the symptoms changed and in four or five months the entire condition was gone. Two children became infected from this slatternly fellow, one on the thigh and cheek and the other in and about the eye. He began with Syphilinum in one an Muriatic acid in the other and followed up with one remedy after another the same as with the man for six to seven months. These children are now grown up an not a symptomatic taint of syphilis has appeared since. The way these three cases were followed up mostly from symptoms of the skin lesions as they changed from time to time is a marvel to me to this day."


CLARKE J. H., Radium as an Internal Remedy (c11)
"Radium bromatum
Case
Mr. M. T., aged 28, had had syphilis seven years before, and had still some faint symptoms of it about him........
On December 1st Rad. bro. Was again given, but without good result. On October 1st following it again did good for a time. In this case the relief was only temporary."

FARRINGTON E. A., Lesser Writings (with Therapeutic Hints and Some Clinical Cases) (fr3)

"Cholesterinum

Case
Whatever may be said against the class of remedies, or remedies of which this is a sample, I, for the one, will ever feel grateful towards Dr. Jeanes for introducing this bile of the Terrapin, Cholos. Terrapin. He recommends it for "cramps in the calves", a symptom it has often removed. Quite recently, I gave it in a case of Secondary Syphilis with these cramps as a prominent symptom. In three weeks, the sore-throat, pains in bones and cramps disappeared, and four or five vesicles formed at the site of the old Chancre. These have disappeared, leaving the patient apparently well. In olden times, Terrapin was used in venereal diseases.

Syphilis
Mercurius iodatus flavus

Case
I can testify that high potencies will cure Syphilis, and potentized Mercurial preparations will produce symptoms similar to those of Syphilis; the Iodide of Mercury in the one-thousandth potency has produced a pimple or papule which resembles a hard Chancre; and this same Iodide of Mercury, given in repeated doses for days continually, has cured this kind of Chancre in a number of instances. It has also cured a secondary sore-throat which was developed six or seven weeks afterwards, but which on the continuance of the medicine disappeared and for nine years was not been seen.

I have also produced similar results with the five-hundredth potency, getting an ulcer that looked as though it were punched out at the top; of this I am positive from my own personal observation, and I know this to be the case in the experience of Dr. Macfarlan of this city, who has proved this thing by experiments, and whose cures I have seen. "

GUANAVANTE S. M., The "Genius" of Homoeopathic Remedies (gvt2)
"Exercises with case studies
- 77. Congenital syphilis : A child, about four months old, had congenital syphilis, such as the old school consider necessarily fatal.

- The child had sores all over.
- He could not bear to be touched or approached.
- Rx_________ cured him right along.
- Now, five years of age, he is bright and healthy."

HOYNE T. S., Clinical Therapeutics (he1) Volume 1

"Phosphorus
Syphilis
- CASE 219
- Darkey, with syphilis, the disease destroying the hair, skin and bone of the crown of the head.
- Had tried all sorts of treatment without benefit.
- Phos. 200 was given daily, with constant improvement for three months, when we lost sight of him.
- I have no doubt that he was cured by the treatment, as he was nearly well when we last saw him.
- Hoyne.

Rhus toxicodendron
Syphilis
- Occasionally we find this drug useful in secondary and tertiary syphilis.

- CASE 248
- Secondary syphilis.
- Sweat in second sleep for a month;
- aching in glans penis;
- after urination a few drops escape.
- Cured by one dose of Rhus 200 and a few doses of the 3d, which patient took on his own account.
- Dr. E.W. Berridge.

Sulphur
Syphilis

- CASE 326
- Hereditary syphilis.
- Miss T., aged thirteen, had been afflicted from infancy with a syphilitic skin eruption appearing upon the bend of the elbows, and spreading over a large portion of the arms and body.
- Sulphur 200 was prescribed, once a week, for two months.
- After the second dose the eruption came out over her entire body, remained for ten or twelve days, and gradually passed away, leaving at the end of ten weeks no trace of the disease.
- Medical Advance.

- CASE 327
- W., aged eighteen.
- Syphilitic ulcers in throat;
- swelling of the testicles, left one hanging down.
- Soreness in the epigastrium;
- pain in the stomach, relieved by evacuating the bowels;
- feces watery. - Wakes often at night.
- Sulphur 81000, one dose.
- Twenty days afterwards, a chancre appeared on the penis, which lasted two weeks.
- But the one dose was given, and a cure resulted. - Dr. geo. f. Foote.

- CASE 328
- Rupia.
- L., aged forty-two, had syphilis five or six years ago.
- Eruption and sores upon his arms and chest, worst upon the former, commencing as small vesicles filled with serum, maturing the pustules, and afterward covered with thick, dirty-looking scabs., often close together;
- arms itch very much when he gets warm.
- Sulphur 20 and 200, cured in a month.
- Dr. B.F. Betts.

Arsenicum album
Psoriasis

- CASE 781
- Mrs. R., aged thirty-four, contracted syphilis from her husband two years previous to treatment.
- Has now psoriasis plantaris and mucous tubercles in the vagina.
- Has been Homoeopathically treated with large doses of Mercury.
- Was confined eighteen months ago and lost her baby two weeks afterwards, it being covered with a syphilitic eruption, which the physician pronounced rose rash.
- Nitric. acid. 200, one dose a day for a week.
- Afterwards Ars. 200, one dose a day, was given for nearly if not quite six months.
- Confined Mrs. R., in November, 1875.
- Her baby has never shown any sign of syphilis, and is in appearance as healthy a baby as one can find anywhere.
- Mrs. R. has shown no signs of syphilis since she discontinued treatment at the dispensary.
- Hoyne.

Mercurius solubilis
Chancre
- We believe Mercurius cor. 30 or 200 is the best remedy for chancre if the patient has received no treatment whatever.
- Ichor firmly adheres to the bottom of the ulcer;
- grayish discharge.

- CASE 949
- John aged twenty-two, coachman, three days ago noticed a small sore on the prepuce, which he did not think amounted to much until he compared notes with other members of the fraternity.
- The discharge is slight in quantity, and of a grayish color.
- Has taken no medicine whatever. - Merc. cor. 200 every three hours.
- Entirely well in one week without other medicine.
- Hoyne.

- CASE 950
- S., carpenter, aged thirty-two, has a small Hunterian chancre on the prepuce.
- First noticed it day before yesterday, eight days after an impure connection.
- Merc. cor. 200 every three hours cured in less than a week.
- Hoyne.

- CASE 951
- Of 800 or 1000 cases, all were cured by Merc. sol. 4 to 6, night and morning, one dose.
- Dr. J. Schneider.

- CASE 952
- Gentleman aged thirty-five has been syphilitic at various times, and always taken large doses of Mercury.
- Small ulcers on edge of preputium, great deal of inflammation around it, and much itching.
- Merc. viv. 200, one dose cured.
- Dr. Ad. Lippe.

- CASE 954
- Chancre and secondary syphilis, as enlargement of the glands;
- psoriasis upon the nape of the neck; - nodes upon the tibia sensitive to pressure; - angina faucium with gray ulceration, hoarseness, fetor of breath, cured by Merc. sol. - Dr. Arcularius.

- CASE 955
- Mr. M. aged forty-six, contracted about eight months ago a small ulcer on the glans, bearing all the signs of a true chancre.
- Ulcer was touched with caustic, and lint soaked in a solution corrosive sublimate was applied to it.
- In seven or eight days, a dirty-brown cicatrix was formed.
- He was pronounced cured. - Four weeks had elapsed when throat began to be painful on swallowing, patient thought he had taken cold;
- increased secretion of saliva, peculiar taste in mouth;
- small round ulcers appeared on palate, tonsils, and glans.
- The syphilitic specialist ordered gargles and decoctions of Sarsaparilla, still the throat grew rapidly worse in spite of the treatment.
- I found tonsils much swollen;
- arch of the fauces swollen; - both were affected with roundish ulcers, the size of half a nail, whose lardaceous cream-like surface was somewhat depressed;
- uvula thickened and elongated;
- gums spongy, bleeding easily;
- color of hard palate, soft palate and uvula is a dirty reddish-brown;
- swallowing painful;
- great collection of saliva;
- taste metallic.
- Patient took, for a few weeks, Merc. sol., Hahn., 2d and 3rd trituration, morning and evening.
- The chancres, which returned at the glans toward the end of the third week, I left untouched;
- they healed within from six to eight days, reappeared after a while, in order to heal again equally fast.
- Most stubbornly up to the tenth week, the puffiness of palatine arches and swelling of tonsils continued, likewise their reddish-brown color;
- in consequence of which, swallowing was difficult.
- Under Merc. praecip. rub., 2d trit., there appeared, in eight to ten days, a normal color and formation of the different parts of the throat, and complete health.
- Dr. Watze.

Ulceration of cervix uteri
- Dr. D.A. Gorton reports the following :

- CASE 960 (Mercurius solubils)
- An excrescence at the os uteri causing constant sanguineous stillicidium, and caused by syphilis was radically cured by the steady use of Merc. sol. 200.
- Thuja 200 produced only improvement.
- Dr. Meurer.

Nitricum acidum
Gonorrhoeal and syphilitic ophthalmia

- CASE 975
- Syphilitic ophthalmia.
- Eye was exceedingly painful, burning;
- it looked yellow;
- conjunctiva was standing out here and there;
- eye was opaque, and seemed filled with a yellow fluid.
- Nit. ac. 200, two doses, cured in two days.
- Dr. C.J. Hempel.

Iritis
- Iritis, especially syphilitic, for relapses.

- CASE 976
- Syphilitic iritis.
- On lying down, or even inclining head from the upright position, feeling as if warm water was flowing over and both eyes, first right, then left, relieved by cold water.
- Nit. ac. 200 cured.
- Dr. E.. Berridge.

Buboes
- Buboes after the failure or abuse of mercury.

- CASE 1000
- Mr. G., aged thirty-five, has had syphilis for four years.
- Does not wish to take Mercury as he has found out that it has been a damage rather than a benefit to him.
- At the present time has rupial sores on the forehead and scalp (eight or ten) from one-half to three-fourth inches in diameter and one-fourth to one-half inches in height.
- No particular pain anywhere.
- Bowels constipated.
- Gave him Nit. ac. 200 to counteract the Mercury, (six pills morning and noon) and Sulphur 200 for the constipation (six pills at bedtime).
- Nov. 6th, constipation entirely relieved.
- Rupial sores about the same.
- Ars. 200, six pills twice a day.
- Dec. 27th, scabs have fallen off the flesh underneath looks very well indeed.
- Medicine continued every night at bedtime.
- Jan. 3, 1875, no signs of sores about the forehead or head.
- Feels well with the exception of slight pains in the limbs at night and in damp weather.
- Considering these pains due to the Mercury he had received Nit. ac. 200 every three hours was ordered.
- In two weeks he reported cured.
- Duration of treatment eighty-six days.
- Have seen the patient frequently since, even as late as Dec. 1877, and he has no signs of syphilis about him.
- Hoyne.

- CASE 1001
- M., aged forty, contracted syphilis six weeks ago.
- Has received plenty of Homoeopathic treatment;
- for instance Merc. iod. 1x, Merc. sol. 1x, Merc. cor. 1x, etc., etc.
- Was partially salivated, but his chancre has grown larger;
- is situated on head of penis, is about the size of the thumb nail and is discharging a copious yellow slime.
- Paraphymosis is a distressing accompaniment. - Prepuce seems to be filled with a large quantity of water.
- Apis 200 every two hours.
- Life if any improvement followed this prescription.
- Paraphymosis grew worse.
- Rhus 200 every two hours.
- Nit. ac. (1 to 200) was applied as a dressing to the chancre.
- Considerable improvement followed this prescription which was kept up for several weeks.
- Nit. ac. 200 was used after the paraphymosis had subsided and a perfect cure followed.
- Hoyne.

Impotence
- Nitric acid. has been used successfully, but Lycopodium is a far better remedy.

- CASE 1002
- R., aged twenty-seven, had gonorrhoea which yielded to Copaiva.
- Afterwards a condylomata appeared which Thuja 200 failed to relieve.
- In fact five other condylomata appeared which grew rapidly.
- The medicine was suspended five weeks, and still they grew larger and larger.
- No pain but frequent pollutions.
- Nit. ac. 200 one dose cured completely in sixteen days.
- Dr. Ad. Fellger.

- CASE 1003
- Mrs. B., aged forty.
- Syphilitic laryngitis, with almost complete aphonia.
- Nit. ac. cured in about four months.
- Hoyne.

- CASE 1004
- Sloughing of the entire integument of the penis and prepuce;
- a fistulous ulcer, one inch posterior to the corona glandis, extending into the urethra, and a very unhealthy, or phagedenic, ulcerated condition of the entire diseased surface.
- Had been discharged as incurable from one of the large hospitals of Philadelphia.
- Dressed the parts with sweet oil.
- Nit. ac. 200 cured.
- Dr. H.N. Guernsey.

- CASE 1005
- M., aged thirty--five.
- Ulcerated sore throat;
- had syphilis four years ago;
- three large deep ulcers, with bluish margins and red centres near root of tongue;
- tonsils nearly sloughed off;
- pain from taking the least nourishment;
- foul odor from mouth.
- Nit. ac. 6 cured in two weeks.
- Dr. W.T. Edmundson.

- CASE 1006
- W., aged nineteen, has had syphilis six months, which is made painful by exercise and damp weather.
- Not so painful when warm in bed.
- The end of the prepuce is in fissures;
- phymosis.
- He had been using Mercury and injections for several months without effect.
- Nit. ac. 5m, two doses, cured in two months.
- Dr. Geo. F. Foote.

HOYNE T. S., Clinical Therapeutics (he1) Volume 2

"Asa foetida
Syphilis

- CASE 97
- Tertiary syphilis in a man aged forty.
- Large ulcer upon the right leg with a bluish, hard edge, painful to the touch;
- nightly pains in the tibiae;
- bone very sensitive to touch.
- Nit. ac. 200 benefited him for a while.
- Afterward Asaf. 200 cured.
- Hoyne.

Petroleum
Venereal diseases

- CASE 362
- Secondary syphilis with brown spots on the arms, neck and chest, and lower limbs;
- also falling off of the hair and rheumatic stiffness of the shoulders and ankles.
- Petr. 200 produced a radical cure.
- Dr. J. B. Bell.

Thuja occidentalis
Syphilitic iritis

- Here it may be given for large, wart-like excrescences on the iris, with severe, sharp, sticking pains in the eye, aggravated at night, and ameliorated by warmth.

- CASE 393
- Syphilitic iritis, with inflammation and condylomatous growth upon the iris, with nearly total occlusion of pupil.
- Thuj. 30 and 200 cured.
- Dr. A. K. Hills.

Warts

- CASE 433
- A boy, having upon his person fourteen warts, called for treatment;
- examined the diathesis and concluded it to be syphilitic, warts being large, pedunculated and ragged.
- I prescribed Thuj. 500, a powder on rising and retiring.
- In one week they became very much swollen, and in another had entirely disappeared.
- Dr. S. R. Waugh.

- CASE 434
- In a great many cases treated for warts with Thuj. 30 and Thuj. 200, I have noted the fact that the majority are cured in seven weeks.
- Many cases require a much longer time.
- An old man who had syphilitic warts for many years, and had taken much Iodide of Potash and Mercury, required nearly two years treatment with Thuj. 30 and Thuj. 200, to cure him.
- Dr. I. S. Linsley.

Zincum metallicum
Iritis

- CASE 443
- Syphilitic iritis.
- The pains did not come on until he lay down at night, and then would come profuse, hot, scalding lachrymation.
- The pains were dull;
- involved balls and brows;
- cannot sleep over ten minutes;
- he must wake with eyes full of burning water;
- no discharge of mucus or pus;
- indeed, rather dryness of conjunctiva, and ball and lids are much inflamed.
- The aggravation on lying is marked.
- Stilling. had removed the pains in the fore-arms and legs, but had not relieved the eyes.
- Arsen. and Merc. had not benefited him;
- Nux vom. gave him relief, but the first dose of Zinc. 200 worked wonders, and his eyes got rapidly well, and in three weeks could see No. 20 type at twenty feet, showing vision normal, though his eyes were weak after exercising them, and some slight aspersion of the iris to the capsule of the lens remained.
- Dr. T. F. Allen.

Lachesis mutus
Aphonia

- CASE 622
- In a very bad case of syphilitic phagedaena of the soft palate and fauces, which threatened to destroy the entire pharynx, the ulceration was arrested (by Lach.) and healed kindly.
- In the case of a lady who was recovering from a large pelvic abscess, which had caused a contraction of the psoas muscle, drawing the knee up toward the abdomen.
- Lach. removed the contraction in a very short time. (B. J. H. 1873, p. 127.)

Aurum metallicum

- CASE 1039
Syphilitic hyperostoses of cranial bones
- Had chancres four years ago;
- has also had gonorrhoea;
- has been under treatment during the past two years without deriving any benefit, he having been apparently treated with tonics;
- "weakness and headache" were his complaints, and no one, he says, ever questioned him about his previous history.
- Has not, it would seem, had Mercury at all.
- Patient is a short, thick-set man, of strongish build;
- his appearance strikes one as very cachectic;
- he is anaemic, but not emaciated : he is very dull and low-spirited;
- his tongue is very large, deeply notched at its margins by the teeth, and very pale;
- breath does not smell badly;
- he cannot wear his hat, as his head is larger than it used to be, and it is likewise very tender.
- He says the pains in his head are very, very bad, and they torment him these two years;
- they are truly fearful in the night;
- he also complains of pains in the long bones, worse at night, and worse in the left side of the body.
- On examining the hairy scalp three tophi are discovered about the size of hazel nuts;
- there is also a large tophus in the region of the left frontal protuberance, about the size of a split walnut, but rather flatter.
- Aurum mur. 3x, one pilule every four hours.
- My patient's bony tumors were also more painful when touched;
- so tender, indeed, that he could not bear the pressure of his hat.
- Aur. cured.
- Dr. J. C. Burnett.

Ozaena
- Aurum metallicum acts especially on the bones of the head and face, and in syphilitic ozaena, and caries of the nasal bones, is the remedy par excellence.

- CASE 1043
- In one case which I recall to mind, the patient, a man aet forty-six, with syphilitic caries and ozaena, who had been under homoeopathic treatment for a period of three or more years without any improvement, but getting worse all the time, so that he talked of committing suicide, and did actually attempt it, was entirely cured in about two months with Aurum 30th.
- His wife who had syphilitic psoriasis took Ars. 200 with great benefit.

- CASE 1046
- Dr. Hendricks Sr., spoke about ozaena, an ulcerous process in the nose, with greenish-yellow discharge mixed with blood.
- Aurum has been much recommended, but is useless unless the nasal bones are affected.
- He cured a gentleman who had been treated allopathically a long time.
- The nasal bones were swollen, the root of the nose was sunken, the discharge was not profuse but was so offensive that as the patient came into the ante-room, in a few minutes all the people ran out.
- Possibly syphilis was at the bottom of it.

Syphilis

- CASE 1053
Tertiary
- cured by Aurum 3, four times a day.
- Weak solution of Carbolic acid topically.
- Dr. Hamilton Rickaby.

- CASE 1054
- Mrs. A., aged thirty-two.
- Norwegian by birth, first came to the hospital for treatment early in July, 1877.
- Three years before (1874) she had a large ulcer on the leg, which was treated allopathically for many months and finally healed, leaving a large cicatrix.
- Soon after, or a little over a year ago (1876), another ulcer made its appearance upon the other leg in the neighborhood of the ankle, which has continued to grow in circumference.
- Three months before she came to the dispensary (April, 1877), the nose became affected and ulceration soon took place.
- I elicited the fact that some years ago she had a few little sores about the external genital organs, which disappeared after a time, she meanwhile using some sort of ointment.
- The ulceration about the nose involved, to a certain extent, the nasal bones.
- The skin of the face, especially under the eye and in the immediate neighborhood of the large ulcer, has a coppery-red color, resembling somewhat an erysipelatous inflammation.
- This color is not confined to the left side of the face, but passes over the nose and is most marked just below the right eye.
- There is no pain or tenderness anywhere except when slight pressure is made over the nasal bones.
- Although the ulceration is confined to the left side of the face and nose, slight pressure over the bone upon the right side occasions some pain, showing that side is involved to a certain extent.
- In the mouth another large ulcer on the hard palate which also involves the bone and, at one time, communicated with the nasal passage.
- The patient at first complained of a discharge into the mouth through this opening - the discharge consisting of nasal mucus and pus.
- This is no longer the case now as the opening or sinus seems to have become obliterated.
- We have two other ulcers, a large and a small one upon the ankle.
- When we first saw this sore it presented an indolent appearance, was covered with a thick, lardaceous matter, with pale, flabby granulations;
- had a foul smell and showed no disposition whatevertoheal.
- In fact it was constantly extending in circumference.
- Nitric acid 30.
- Slight improvement followed this prescription.
- I now selected as being specific to syphilitic affections of the nasal bones, Aurum m., which was given in the 6th three times a day.
- Under the influence of this remedy the patient improved from week to week, so far as the face and nose were concerned.
- On July 22, a piece of bone about as thick as the thumb nail, and three-eighths of an inch square, was exfoliated and discharged through the nasal opening.
- Ever since then this ulcer has gradually been growing smaller until now when it is about two-thirds the size of the original sore.
- This patient was still improving under this prescription the last time we saw her.
- Hoyne."


HUGHES R., A Manual of Therapeutics: According to the Method of Hahnemann (hs5)
'Letter XIII
General diseases
The venereal maladies
Syphilis

I have given these citations at some length, because it cannot fail to be a serious question with you whether homoeopathy has anything better to offer in the treatment of tertiary syphilis than the full doses of iodide of potassium to which you have been accustomed. When rapidity of action is required, as in painful nodes, or when gummata are exciting neuralgia, epilepsy, or paralysis, I think that the common practice can hardly be excelled, and is imperative upon us for our patients' sake.

The other anti syphilitics, and also asyphilitics (to use Hahnemann's nomenclature), may come in when indicated, as the following case, taken from the North American Journal of Homoeopathy, will show,-demonstrating at the same time how much may be done in confirmed syphilis by pure homoeopathic medication:-

"A Portuguese, about thirty years of age, had been in the hospital at Lahaina for eighteen months; during this time he passed through all stages of the syphilitic virus. When he arrived at Honolulu, the first day of July, he exhibited the most loathsome and disgusting appearance. The right side of his face was covered with a most foetid ulcer of the tertiary form of syphilis: it developed itself over the right eye, down the outer angle and under the eye to the nose, extending to the mouth over the whole cheek, leaving the malar bone entirely bare and dry. There was carious affection of the frontal bone, extending over the right eye around to the temporal bone; the malar and nasal bones were more or less destroyed by the disease. The right eye was entirely closed. These ulcers were discharging a very foetid and offensive watery fluid, and had a dark-red appearance. In addition to all this he had ascites, and was greatly bloated; from this he had suffered for the last six months. The ulcers were very painful; darting and gnawing pain, burning through the whole of the ulcerated surface, as he expressed it, as if there were red-hot needles sticking in the ulcers.

"For these symptoms I selected Ars. alb. third, three doses a day for three days, which greatly relieved the burning and mitigated the pain; but he was not relieved from the pain wholly until he took Belladonna, third, three or four doses. After these two remedies ceased to improve, I gave Acid. nit. morning and evening; improvement followed; after the first week I gave but one dose per day, for two weeks. Under the action of these remedies, the ulcers put on a more healthy appearance, until the end of three weeks, when I could not discover any improvement. I then gave Aurum muriat., second, one dose per day. This seemed to stop all progress of caries, and the whole case looked favourable. I continued this remedy three weeks, with occasionally a dose of Sulphur, sixth. The healing of the ulcers was steady and permanent. His general health improved, appetite good. The digestive organs completely restored. The urinary secretion became normal, he gained strength and flesh. A few doses of Hepar sulph., and Ars. alb., sixth, were then given at intervals of three or four days. These last remedies removed all symptoms of dropsy and venereal disease about him. A more grateful person I never saw." '

[manioberoi]

I just noticed that while trying to clarify your "MAY", you had to resort to the use of "seem" ... are you actually sure about any of this?!? Or is it considered "good homeopathic practice" to just make it up as you go along?:confused:

While you have been merrily wandering through your own illogical view of the world, you seem to have stated above that no physical testing of homoeopathy is possible ... and yet in your earlier post #520 (the one you explicitly refered me back to read), you came up with the following ...



Please make your mind up - can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?
physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.

The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable.

[Rolfe]

.... I want to know how effective homeopaths have been in treating syphilis versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis.

.... reams of unverifiable historical verbiage with no evidence either of the accuracy of the diagnoses or a causal effect of the nostrums administered ....

Will you answer the lady's actual question, for pity's sake??!!!

Rolfe.

[manioberoi]

Will you answer the lady's actual question, for pity's sake??!!!

Rolfe.
Since she wished to go back 200 years..........................

On a more serious note most good homeopaths do appreciate the importance of the pathologist, radiologist & c. They also consider the public health point of view, and should not hesitate to direct suitable cases to a conventional medical facility.

Today, a case of syphilis (primary) clearly needs referral to a conventional medical facility.

That is not to say that syphilis is not treatable homeopathically. All I am saying is that on ethical and legal considerations a case of syphilis, as of today, be referred to conventional medical facility.

Antibiotics are effective in syphilis; unfortunately they do not remove 100 percent of the T. pallidum as has been accepted by Dr Anthony Campbell in British Homoeopathic Journal Volume 68, Number 4, October 1979.

[kieran]

One of the miasms that Hahnemann identified was syphilis. We can assume that he treated persons with syphilis, and there is most likely historical data to show how homeopaths have treated syphilis over the last two centuries.

I want to know how effective homeopaths have been in treating syphilis versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis.


CASE E. E.,
...
[snipped out lots of irrelevant crap]
...
CLARKE J. H.,
...
[snipped out some more irrelevant crap]
...
FARRINGTON E. A.,
...
[snipped out even more irrelevant crap]
...
GUANAVANTE S. M.,
...
[snipped out even more irrelevant crap]
...
HOYNE T. S., Clinical Therapeutics (he1) Volume 1
...- CASE 248
...- CASE 326
[you can guess what happened here...]


Despite all the irrelevant crap you obviously copy-pasted ... you point blank missed off answering the actual question ... versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis ...

I thought we had already established that a control was essential to determine whether there is any effect due to homoeopathic remedies ... but all you do is keep loading up our screen with sh!te displaying your lack of understanding of this point.:boggled:

None of the pointless "CASE studies" you listed has the basic elements involved to determine anything of interest to anyone. Why did you list them? What did you hope to achieve? Did you think we would all suddenly say ... "gosh, there are lots of stories around ... homoeopathy must be right in that case"?:rolleyes:

[Lothian]

On a more serious note most good homeopaths do appreciate the importance of the pathologist, radiologist & c. They also consider the public health point of view, and should not hesitate to direct suitable cases to a conventional medical facility.Can you define suitable cases? Where the patient is Ill perhaps ?

[manioberoi]

Despite all the irrelevant crap you obviously copy-pasted ... you point blank missed off answering the actual question ... versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis ...

I thought we had already established that a control was essential to determine whether there is any effect due to homoeopathic remedies ... but all you do is keep loading up our screen with sh!te displaying your lack of understanding of this point.:boggled:

None of the pointless "CASE studies" you listed has the basic elements involved to determine anything of interest to anyone. Why did you list them? What did you hope to achieve? Did you think we would all suddenly say ... "gosh, there are lots of stories around ... homoeopathy must be right in that case"?:rolleyes:
Not at all - I was fully aware of non acceptance of ALL of the published materia medica and ALL of the homeopathic trials published in any journal except those which subscribe to the viewpoint (of the drug majors?) :

"that homeopathy is placebo and can never be proven to work and hence does not work and is a fraud."

[MRC_Hans]

*snip*
KINDLY CONFIRM.

We may then be able to evolve the discussion further.I hereby confirm that I stand by any and every post I have made in this thread, and on this forum, and everywhere else on the internet.

An occasional post of mine may have been made with the intent of joking, but I stand by that as well.


..... What do you mean, you need us to confirm? If you can use what we wrote, then present your next starement, and the discussion will automatically commence.

Hans

[kieran]

Since she wished to go back 200 years..........................

I think we are all wondering why there doesn't seem to be a single shred of credible evidence over that time scale. I think 200 years gives you the maximum period over which to present your evidence, but you can limit yourself to recent studies if you want to keep the scope more manageable.;)

On a more serious note most good homeopaths do appreciate the importance of the pathologist, radiologist & c. They also consider the public health point of view, and should not hesitate to direct suitable cases to a conventional medical facility.

Today, a case of syphilis (primary) clearly needs referral to a conventional medical facility.

That is not to say that syphilis is not treatable homeopathically. All I am saying is that on ethical and legal considerations a case of syphilis, as of today, be referred to conventional medical facility.

None of us give two hoots about whether you think there is a place for "conventional" medicine in treating illnesses - we are all wondering why you don't appear to realize that there is no proof what so ever that there is a place for homoeopathic medicine there ...:boggled:

Antibiotics are effective in syphilis; unfortunately they do not remove 100 percent of the T. pallidum as has been accepted by Dr Anthony Campbell in British Homoeopathic Journal Volume 68, Number 4, October 1979.
So a homoeopath has conducted a study on the efficacy of conventional medicine ... :rolleyes:

Did he apply the same loose protocols that get applied to homoeopathic research by homoeopaths?
Has he conducted any properly controlled trials (see our previous posts to remind yourself what that actually involves) on the effect of homoeopathy on the percentage of T. pallidum and compared it with a placebo group?

If he hasn't done the latter then why did you add this to your list of pointless references?:confused:

[manioberoi]

Can you define suitable cases? Where the patient is Ill perhaps ?
Even dangerously ill cases where ALL conventional medicine has failed have been cured by homeopathy.

However current ethical and legal standards demand that a homeopath direct ALL critically ill persons to a conventional medical facility. Not to do so would invite strictest action from the authorities as also the (in India) the CCH(Central Council for Homeopathy).

[MRC_Hans]

EASILY EXPLAINED:

“opposition of ideas between the paragraph 32, 117, 136 and 138. *sniiiiiiiiip*
to prescribe for the dynamic disturbance and not for the disease.”

[Homoeopathic Links (_Hom_links) 1997 Autumn
Evolution of homoeopathic materia medica based on rigorous provings Patrick Brillant, India]I'm sorry, I'm NOT going to struggle through a jumble of Hahemann quotes, mixed with comments with no marking. I have read the Organon 3-4 times, that is quite enough, thank you.

Note that most of us are able to express our opinion in a few paragraps. Please practice that.

Hans

[Rolfe]

Even dangerously ill cases where ALL conventional medicine has failed have been cured by homeopathy have unexpectedly got better on their own.
There, fixed that for you.

Rolfe.

[SYLVESTER1592]

physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.

The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable.

This answer makes no sense at all... Try again:
Please make your mind up - can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?

Explain why or why not...

Quote: "The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable".
What does that mean? :boggled:
1) the rest of the world is applicable: you choose to apply the world???
2) There are non-physical influences? What are they? Do you have evidence of them?

Quote:"physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.

1)What non-physical evidence proves homeopathy works?
2) So only the diluted remedy can be tested, but not the dilution itself (which is the actual treatment)?

Being mysterious is being wrong. Be correct, precise and clear and above all honest. A non-straight forward reply does not constitute an answer

SYL :)

PS. You still haven't answered my previous post

[kieran]

Not at all - I was fully aware of non acceptance of ALL of the published materia medica and ALL of the homeopathic trials published in any journal except those which subscribe to the viewpoint (of the drug majors?) :

"that homeopathy is placebo and can never be proven to work and hence does not work and is a fraud."

I see ... you have now moved on to the "defence by conspiracy theory" approach.

You are implying that "published materia medica" has deliberately with-held "all" studies that use accepted protocols and conclusively prove that homoeopathy works ... that is such obvious b@ll@cks of a smokescreen that I hope you are already embarassed by it - Did I denounce your long-winded and pathetic list because of where its contents were published? NO - I denounced the lack of proper protocols in those studies.

We have already described simple ways that you could convince us - these involve proper controls, not just rambling anecdotes. Homoeopaths are free to publish the results of properly controlled studies in the homoeopathic literature - yet no-one has done so ... I think even you can make the next logical step ...

You don't appear to be listening to, or understanding, the points being made to you by posters on this board ... if homoeopathy works - great - lets prove it and all move on to bigger and better things ... otherwise ...

Your latest invented obstacle .. the conspriacy theory ... should be consigned to the dustbin without further ado. I know you'll have another excuse coming ... shall we move on to it?

[MRC_Hans]

For a few moments, I had hopes for this one, but ... :nope:

Were' deep into hand-wawing and anecdotes.

I'll give you one more chance:

Manioberoi, we have now discussed possible protocols to some lenght, and you seem interested in protocol design. Please, taking into account our inputs, post your suggestion for a trial protocol. Especially, you, as the homeopath, should suggest the target complaint, and you should address what confounders you shink should be guarded against (you already mentioned coffee and smoking).

Also mention any demographical constraints that you think apply, and finally, suggest a timeline for the study.

Hans

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Will you answer the lady's actual question, for pity's sake??!!!

Rolfe.

Hear, hear!

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

From your recent posts you still seem not to want to answer the most simple question about the basic testability of homeopathy


Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

I think it is time you answered that simple question with a simple answer not yet more reams of anecdote pulled from your sacred texts.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Originally Posted by MRC_Hans :
Now you are contradicting your self. You earlier said, twice for emphasis, even, that a proving cannot be replicated.

Now, either there is a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy, in which case a proving can obviously be replicated,

or,

a proving cannot be replicated, in which case there cannot be a finite set of symptoms associated with a given remedy.

Please make up you mind, which is it? You can't have both.

Hans

Reply:
"at any point in time""at any point in time"

So the proving is dependent on the time in which the proving is done. Now this means that you have to do a proving regularly in order to get a decent treatment and a case description won't help you then, because it is in the past and you are using a current remedy, or not...:confused:

SYL :)

[fls]

Ya gotta love it.

Manioberoi posts a series of cases that describe exactly what you'd expect to see as you pass through the primary, secondary and tertiary stages of syphillis, in the absence of treatment. It is unusual for the signs and symptoms of primary and secondary syphillis not to disappear in absence of treatment. And the majority of untreated patients never go on to develop signs and symptoms of tertiary disease.

Just how stupid do you think we are? Next you're going to be claiming that homeopathic treatment leads to growth in children by listing a series of cases of seven-year-olds that gained a foot in height over three years.

Linda

[manioberoi]

I think we are all wondering why there doesn't seem to be a single shred of credible evidence over that time scale. I think 200 years gives you the maximum period over which to present your evidence, but you can limit yourself to recent studies if you want to keep the scope more manageable.;)



None of us give two hoots about whether you think there is a place for "conventional" medicine in treating illnesses - we are all wondering why you don't appear to realize that there is no proof what so ever that there is a place for homoeopathic medicine there ...:boggled:


So a homoeopath has conducted a study on the efficacy of conventional medicine ... :rolleyes:

Did he apply the same loose protocols that get applied to homoeopathic research by homoeopaths?
Has he conducted any properly controlled trials (see our previous posts to remind yourself what that actually involves) on the effect of homoeopathy on the percentage of T. pallidum and compared it with a placebo group?

If he hasn't done the latter then why did you add this to your list of pointless references?:confused:
The homeopath was only quoting from the learned journals. In any case there is a lot of uncertainty in ascertaining syphilitic status and in efficacy of treatment using conventional antibiotics;

Sex Transm Dis. 2005 Jan;32(1):1-6.
The overall cure rate was 61%.


Sexually Transmitted Diseases Treatment Guidelines 2006 (CDC)

Treatment failure can occur with any regimen. However, assessing response to treatment frequently is difficult, and definitive criteria for cure or failure have not been established. Nontreponemal test titers might decline more slowly for persons who previously had syphilis. Patients should be reexamined clinically and serologically 6 months and 12 months after treatment; more frequent evaluation might be prudent if follow-up is uncertain.
Patients who have signs or symptoms that persist or recur or who have a sustained fourfold increase in nontreponemal test titer (i.e., compared with the maximum or baseline titer at the time of treatment) probably failed treatment or were reinfected. These patients should be retreated and reevaluated for HIV infection. Because treatment failure usually cannot be reliably distinguished from reinfection with T. pallidum, a CSF analysis also should be performed.

Clinical trial data have demonstrated that 15% of patients with early syphilis treated with the recommended therapy will not achieve a two dilution decline in nontreponemal titer used to define response at 1 year after treatment (100).
[100. Rolfs RT, Joesoef MR, Hendershot EF, et al. A randomized trial of enhanced therapy for early syphilis in patients with and without human immunodeficiency virus infection: the Syphilis and HIV Study Group. N Engl J Med 1997;337:307--14. ]

[kieran]

The homeopath was only quoting from the learned journals.
Does that translate into "The homeopath was only re-gurgitating hear-say because he wasn't interested in any kind of objective knowledge." ???

In any case there is a lot of uncertainty in ascertaining syphilitic status and in efficacy of treatment using conventional antibiotics;

Sex Transm Dis. 2005 Jan;32(1):1-6.
The overall cure rate was 61%.
...
[snip]
...
[100. Rolfs RT, Joesoef MR, Hendershot EF, et al. A randomized trial of enhanced therapy for early syphilis in patients with and without human immunodeficiency virus infection: the Syphilis and HIV Study Group. N Engl J Med 1997;337:307--14. ]

Welcome to the real world - it is difficult (note - not impossible) to measure the effect of any treatment on some conditions - but at least some people try ...

Were you trying to make a point in your own favour with those references or are you admitting that you finally understand the deficiencies of "case studies" presented in the homoeopathic literature???

[manioberoi]

This answer makes no sense at all... Try again:
Please make your mind up - can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?

Explain why or why not...

Quote: "The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable".
What does that mean? :boggled:
1) the rest of the world is applicable: you choose to apply the world???
2) There are non-physical influences? What are they? Do you have evidence of them?

Quote:"physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.

1)What non-physical evidence proves homeopathy works?
2) So only the diluted remedy can be tested, but not the dilution itself (which is the actual treatment)?

Being mysterious is being wrong. Be correct, precise and clear and above all honest. A non-straight forward reply does not constitute an answer

SYL :)

PS. You still haven't answered my previous post
The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?)

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure - and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac.

So I would take care to see that only water potencies (prepared from globules and not alcohol - as that could be smelt by the homeopath) are given in any trial and the placebo given to the control would be pure water(reverse osmosis purified) if I were to design any kind of homeopathic trial as is being suggested by this forum.

[manioberoi]

:D
This is kind of like playing craps. You change the enchantment on the dice, ... You just keep throwing the dice 'till you get a seven. When you do... the therapy worked. When the patient gets impatient or starts to doubt the "therapy", you get rid of them by sending them to us. Is this how it works? Just curious...
If this still is a personalized optimalization of the remedy... Have there been tests of the difference in effect of the manufacturer or the batch used?

SYL :)
I can undertand your frustration.

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.

In homeopathy, provided a lower 'balancing' potency in the range of 6X to 6C (water) is used the effects are slow in coming up (for the first month) but the cure thereafter is increasingly perceptible and entirely without the kind of side effects stated above.

So even if the homeopath throws the dice successfully the seventh time (most good homeopaths manage it on the first or second throw) the patient will still be benefited more by homeopathy than by conventional medicne in a chronic disease.

[manioberoi]

Does that translate into "The homeopath was only re-gurgitating hear-say because he wasn't interested in any kind of objective knowledge." ???



Welcome to the real world - it is difficult (note - not impossible) to measure the effect of any treatment on some conditions - but at least some people try ...

Were you trying to make a point in your own favour with those references or are you admitting that you finally understand the deficiencies of "case studies" presented in the homoeopathic literature???
I am learning.

[SYLVESTER1592]

The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?)
<SNIP>...

Thank you, that's one

So if all the evidence is questionable, the objective results are lacking in the performed trials, you acknowledge that the chemical difference can not be shown, that the homeopathic solution would only show placebo...
Why pursue the idea that the effect would be different.
If there is an effect on the water even after the diluted chemical substance is gone, why can't you show it?
If the effect is the same as placebo in well-designed trials, if the chemical analysis is the same as placebo, if you can't show the mechanism of action, if you can not produce a reason for it to work... Why can't you draw the conclusion that it is a placebo?

How about those other comments...

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

I also agree that the trials briefly described by the others here seem pretty sound, but i would also add that one single trial like this with a significant result would not be enough on its own. It needs to be reproducable. You need to demonstate the effect several times in order to rule out fluke results.
Would you agree that 6 out of 9 sequential trials where remedies are significantly (the level of significance can be set) more effective than placebo would meet the requirement?

[Mojo]

The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?) Nobody (apart from you in your attempt to introduce this strawman) has suggested "chemically testing" the remedy. You claim that the remedy has an effect; it has been suggested that the remedy should be tested by trying to detect this effect.

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure In other words, people have been known to improve after taking it.

...and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac. Some people are intolerant to lactose.

[SYLVESTER1592]

I can undertand your frustration.

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.

In homeopathy, provided a lower 'balancing' potency in the range of 6X to 6C (water) is used the effects are slow in coming up (for the first month) but the cure thereafter is increasingly perceptible and entirely without the kind of side effects stated above.

So even if the homeopath throws the dice successfully the seventh time (most good homeopaths manage it on the first or second throw) the patient will still be benefited more by homeopathy than by conventional medicne in a chronic disease.
No, you repeat the same supposed treatment over and over again. When it fails, you let conventional medicine fix the problem. When you succeed by chance, you say the new medication did the trick. If there is a chance of the problem clearing up without any help, you take the credit.

You have to show the benefit of what you offer, objectively, controllable, not make believe. If you can not do that, conventional medicine will not accept it. The effect of the physician is always there and plays a big part in the perception of the patient, but the real reason they get better is because they are offered a cure. Demonstrate in a controlled trial, that homeopathy can objectively offer that cure. Repeat it, make it reproducable, so other doctors can be certain they have a cure they can trust. So far homeopathy has failed on all fronts in basic science and in clinical trials.

Why doesn't this worry you...
Trying homeopathy first is not safe because it has no side-effects, it is potentially dangerous because it offers no real benifits to conventional medicine thereby postponing treatment and aggravating the patients condition.

Can you subscribe to that?

SYL :)

[Professor Yaffle]

Would you agree that 6 out of 9 sequential trials where remedies are significantly (the level of significance can be set) more effective than placebo would meet the requirement?

It would need to be a test of treatment of the same condition in each case. Trials would need to be sufficiently large (I'm sure someone else with more expertise will tell us how large they should be), and I'm afraid you couldn't do all the replications yourself. They would need independent replication by someone unconnected with you. Oh, and they would all need to be published...;)

If all those conditions were met, I would be well on the way to being convinced that there was indeed something in it (even though there is nothing in it...).

[krazyKemist]

The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?)

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure - and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac.

So I would take care to see that only water potencies (prepared from globules and not alcohol - as that could be smelt by the homeopath) are given in any trial and the placebo given to the control would be pure water(reverse osmosis purified) if I were to design any kind of homeopathic trial as is being suggested by this forum.

To the risk of repeating myself (and other people here), there is no need for a chemical analysis at this time. If you can prove that it works, using a double blind experiment with a placebo, then we can begin to work on what could be happening physically in the dilution ! Working the other way around is a loss of time and money, especially as we would have to look at an unknown piece of physics/chemistry !

An acceptable placebo would have to be unidentifiable by both the tester and patient as such. Plain, double-distilled, or reverse-osmosed water, the very same that is used for the dilutions without succussion, would be all right for me. Would it be for you ?

the Kemist

[Chris Haynes]

....
Now here is a question I would like answered:

One of the miasms that Hahnemann identified was syphilis. We can assume that he treated persons with syphilis, and there is most likely historical data to show how homeopaths have treated syphilis over the last two centuries.

I want to know how effective homeopaths have been in treating syphilis versus the use of antibiotics for primary stage syphilis.



.... snip of a bunch of stuff that showed them using lots of different remedies... sometimes they worked, sometimes they did not work (Loved the one where the "darkey" was treated then he went away and what happened to him was unknown), HCN

I'll take this as an answer meaning that you do NOT know. There is no compiling of data, no review... and not even a consistent idea of if it is a real diagnosis of syphilis.

Though in reality, the diagnosis of syphilis has been confused with other rashes. It sometimes takes more time to get a real diagnosis, see:
http://www.cmaj.ca/cgi/content/full/176/1/33

Now not all cases of syphilis are resolved with antibiotics, but at least it was recognized, and possibly due to antibiotic resistence:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=9421706

Syphilis is considered an old disease, but is now coming back, so it is being studied again. Here is a document with clinical photos that are not safe for work (well, it is a sexually transmitted disease):
http://sti.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/81/6/448?ijkey=7430c73a863a791d1682a1e55265121c227f6825

One of the new problems is that often syphilis is found in combination with HIV. Not a good thing... especially since India alone has several million people infected with HIV: http://www.who.int/hiv/HIVCP_IND.pdf

So you should get your act together, and figure out quickly which is real medicine versus a 200 year old fairy tale. Oh, and there are Indian HIV patients who are uniting against fake AIDS cures (http://www.reuters.com/article/healthNews/idUSSP24474120070529).

Here is something very disturbing, in researching this I found a Dana Ullman paper where he promotes treating HIV/AIDS with homeopathy. He seems to have munged up all the statitistics though: Controlled clinical trials evaluating the homeopathic treatment of people with human immunodeficiency virus or acquired immune deficiency syndrome. (http://forums.randi.org/Controlled clinical trials evaluating the homeopathic treatment of people with human immunodeficiency virus or acquired immune deficiency syndrome.)

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Even dangerously ill cases where ALL conventional medicine has failed have been cured by homeopathy.

However current ethical and legal standards demand that a homeopath direct ALL critically ill persons to a conventional medical facility. Not to do so would invite strictest action from the authorities as also the (in India) the CCH(Central Council for Homeopathy).

Not if he actually CURED them. :boggled:

[SYLVESTER1592]

The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?)

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure - and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac.

So I would take care to see that only water potencies (prepared from globules and not alcohol - as that could be smelt by the homeopath) are given in any trial and the placebo given to the control would be pure water(reverse osmosis purified) if I were to design any kind of homeopathic trial as is being suggested by this forum.

Since this still isn't an answer to the question, I will ask again:

Quote: "The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable".
What does that mean?
1) the rest of the world is applicable: you choose to apply the world??? I recon this qoute was ment in a different way. Please correct it or explain.
2) There are non-physical influences? What are they? Do you have evidence of them?
Quote:"physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.
1)What non-physical evidence proves homeopathy works?

can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?

Straight forward answer please. Explain why or why not...

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

I see ... you have now moved on to the "defence by conspiracy theory" approach.

You are implying that "published materia medica" has deliberately with-held "all" studies that use accepted protocols and conclusively prove that homoeopathy works ... that is such obvious b@ll@cks of a smokescreen that I hope you are already embarassed by it - Did I denounce your long-winded and pathetic list because of where its contents were published? NO - I denounced the lack of proper protocols in those studies.

We have already described simple ways that you could convince us - these involve proper controls, not just rambling anecdotes. Homoeopaths are free to publish the results of properly controlled studies in the homoeopathic literature - yet no-one has done so ... I think even you can make the next logical step ...

You don't appear to be listening to, or understanding, the points being made to you by posters on this board ... if homoeopathy works - great - lets prove it and all move on to bigger and better things ... otherwise ...

Your latest invented obstacle .. the conspriacy theory ... should be consigned to the dustbin without further ado. I know you'll have another excuse coming ... shall we move on to it?
You have not considered the fact that in conventional medicine, the drug companies research the new drug and independent doctors at research facilities carry out the trials (in the ideal world the drug companies carry no influence on the trial even if they pay for them) with proper double blind controls & c.

Who pays for the trials - the drug companies - who then recover the cost (and more) from the sale of the drug.

As for homeopathic remedies the proving is done by any homeopath or homeopathic organisation.

Manufacture of homeopathic remedies is a relatively routine process requiring no excessive costs of safety trials & c. Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy. Even if he were to feel like carrying out a trial, such as has been suggested here the costs(in the region of 5 to 10 million dollars) would dissuade the richest homeopath from attempting this.

No homeopathic remedy manufacturer would agree to bear the cost since all single homeopathic remedies are FREE to manufacture and there are over 1000 manufacturers of homeopathic remedies worldwide.

So if this forum were to be serious about a long series of homeopathic trials, a little thought needs to be given on how to share out the costs among all the homeopaths and all the homeopathic remedy manufacturers worldwide - and set up an organisation to carry out such a series of trials.

[manioberoi]

I see ... you have now moved on to the "defence by conspiracy theory" approach.

You are implying that "published materia medica" has deliberately with-held "all" studies that use accepted protocols and conclusively prove that homoeopathy works ... that is such obvious b@ll@cks of a smokescreen that I hope you are already embarassed by it - Did I denounce your long-winded and pathetic list because of where its contents were published? NO - I denounced the lack of proper protocols in those studies.

We have already described simple ways that you could convince us - these involve proper controls, not just rambling anecdotes. Homoeopaths are free to publish the results of properly controlled studies in the homoeopathic literature - yet no-one has done so ... I think even you can make the next logical step ...

You don't appear to be listening to, or understanding, the points being made to you by posters on this board ... if homoeopathy works - great - lets prove it and all move on to bigger and better things ... otherwise ...

Your latest invented obstacle .. the conspriacy theory ... should be consigned to the dustbin without further ado. I know you'll have another excuse coming ... shall we move on to it?
You have not considered the fact that in conventional medicine, the drug companies research the new drug and independent doctors at research facilities carry out the trials (in the ideal world the drug companies carry no influence on the trial even if they pay for them) with proper double blind controls & c.

Who pays for the trials - the drug companies - who then recover the cost (and more) from the sale of the drug.

As for homeopathic remedies the proving is done by any homeopath or homeopathic organisation.

Manufacture of homeopathic remedies is a relatively routine process requiring no excessive costs of safety trials & c. Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy. Even if he were to feel like carrying out a trial, such as has been suggested here the costs(in the region of 5 to 10 million dollars) would dissuade the richest homeopath from attempting this.

No homeopathic remedy manufacturer would agree to bear the cost since all single homeopathic remedies are FREE to manufacture and there are over 1000 manufacturers of homeopathic remedies worldwide.

So if this forum were to be serious about a long series of homeopathic trials, a little thought needs to be given on how to share out the costs among all the homeopaths and all the homeopathic remedy manufacturers worldwide - and set up an organisation to carry out such a series of trials.

[manioberoi]

Nobody (apart from you in your attempt to introduce this strawman) has suggested "chemically testing" the remedy. You claim that the remedy has an effect; it has been suggested that the remedy should be tested by trying to detect this effect.

In other words, people have been known to improve after taking it.

Some people are intolerant to lactose.
At 12C???

[krazyKemist]

Not at all - I was fully aware of non acceptance of ALL of the published materia medica and ALL of the homeopathic trials published in any journal except those which subscribe to the viewpoint (of the drug majors?) :

"that homeopathy is placebo and can never be proven to work and hence does not work and is a fraud."

Caution: that's conspiracy theory, that is. Remember ? "good journals are controlled by big bad pharmas ?";)

If we start in this direction, we'll have to move this thread, you know.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

Not if he actually CURED them. :boggled:
The law will act EVEN IF he cured them.

Just as the law would act if it is proved that last month the 15 year old son of a surgeon in India (succesfully )operated a patient (who is not complaining) without the presence of an anaesthetist.

[krazyKemist]

You have not considered the fact that in conventional medicine, the drug companies research the new drug and independent doctors at research facilities carry out the trials (in the ideal world the drug companies carry no influence on the trial even if they pay for them) with proper double blind controls & c.

Who pays for the trials - the drug companies - who then recover the cost (and more) from the sale of the drug.

As for homeopathic remedies the proving is done by any homeopath or homeopathic organisation.

Yep. Definitely delving into conspiracy theory:( . That is a more than a little disappointing.

As we're speaking of monetary interest, do you think homeopaths would benefit if homeopathy is once and for all proven to be only placebo ?

the Kemist

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

I can undertand your frustration.

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.

However, applying the standards of proof that you use, we see that homeopathy can be fatal;

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=85560

What do you say to that?

[fls]

Nevermind.

[Mongrel]

Manufacture of homeopathic remedies is a relatively routine process requiring no excessive costs of safety trials & c. Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy. Even if he were to feel like carrying out a trial, such as has been suggested here the costs(in the region of 5 to 10 million dollars) would dissuade the richest homeopath from attempting this.


Clinical trials for homeopathic remedies would be a lot cheaper. A read through of "An introduction to clinical trials (http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct/info/resources)". For the Phase II trials they sum it up as "the experimental study drug or treatment is given to a larger group of people (100-300) to see if it is effective and to further evaluate its safety." (my bold). Repeat a couple of times to ensure the results are correct and you'll still have change from half a million, and given how much profit the manufacturers and manufacturers do make a year there must be a reason why the excuses get dragged out every time.

[Professor Yaffle]

I'm sorry, you can't use the excuse "we can't afford to do trials". Many trials HAVE been done. They have either been of low quality, had negative results, or been one of the few flukes to show positive results.

[Gord_in_Toronto]

The law will act EVEN IF he cured them.
<SNIP>


Where is this true? In Canada there have been a number of deaths of people (including fairly high profile people) who rejected real medicine to get treated by quacks. No one is charged. A person is seen as responsible for his/her own decisions.

Jehova Witnesses run out of blood all the time.

[SYLVESTER1592]

To the risk of repeating myself (and other people here), there is no need for a chemical analysis at this time. If you can prove that it works, using a double blind experiment with a placebo, then we can begin to work on what could be happening physically in the dilution ! Working the other way around is a loss of time and money, especially as we would have to look at an unknown piece of physics/chemistry !

An acceptable placebo would have to be unidentifiable by both the tester and patient as such. Plain, double-distilled, or reverse-osmosed water, the very same that is used for the dilutions without succussion, would be all right for me. Would it be for you ?

the Kemist

Where is this true? In Canada there have been a number of deaths of people (including fairly high profile people) who rejected real medicine to get treated by quacks. No one is charged. A person is seen as responsible for his/her own decisions.

Jehova Witnesses run out of blood all the time.

In the Netherlands. 3 doctors have recently been suspended for life, they didn't cure their patient and did not offer the conventional treatment but agreed to let the patient get the alternative treatment elsewhere instead. The patient died. The civil suit is still pending. If there will be a criminal suit is not clear.

I highly object to experimenting on patients without proper argumentation and supporting basic research. Our patients are not labrats. There are reasons why we make our clinical trials follow the phase I step first. You do not want to expose patients to something that is potentially harmful or has no effect. Placing it at an equal standard to conventional effective drugs will give doctors the opportunity or even the obligation to consider this unproven drug or treatment above other treatments and thereby denies the patient the proven cure.

Observation in clinical cases that show an effect, may lead to further investigation. This is how sometimes unproven drugs are rolled into a medical experiment anyway to confirm the effects. If they succeed in repeating the effects, further research is done to identify why it works. If the effects are not repeated, the treatment is rejected, end of story. To get it back of the ground again, you have to start at the basis and show how it could work, a probable mechanism and go through the phase I trial after doing all the basic science leg work. If patients choose to use a drug or it's used in experimental conditions overlooked and approved by the ethics committee with proper medical evaluation and back-up care to step in if the trial goes wrong, then maybe this is something that can be discussed. There has to be a reason to try it first.

I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but the question: "can the effects of homeopathy be tested or not?", still stands.

SYL :)

[Chris Haynes]

...I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but the question: "can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?", still stands.

SYL :)


Especially since Dana Ullman claims that homeopathy is a viable treatment for HIV/AIDS:
Controlled clinical trials evaluating the homeopathic treatment of people with human immunodeficiency virus or acquired immune deficiency syndrome. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=12676041&ordinalpos=4&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum)

He really needs to answer to this claim!

[Mojo]

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure - and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac.

So I would take care to see that only water potencies (prepared from globules and not alcohol - as that could be smelt by the homeopath) are given in any trial and the placebo given to the control would be pure water(reverse osmosis purified) if I were to design any kind of homeopathic trial as is being suggested by this forum.Some people are intolerant to lactose.At 12C???


No, the lactose in the sugar pills. You were using this as a reason for using liquid preparations rather than pills, remember.

Incidentally, your objection to the use of alcohol in the preparation doesn't stand: as long as the placebo was made from the same solvent as the remedy, it would smell the same as the remedy.

[Mojo]

However, applying the standards of proof that you use, we see that homeopathy can be fatal;

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=85560


Applying the standards of proof that homoeopathy uses, we've established that it's fatal in this very thread (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2695314#post2695314)!

Post hoc ergo propter hoc. ;)

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Applying the standards of proof that homoeopathy uses, we've established that it's fatal in this very thread (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2695314#post2695314)!

Post hoc ergo propter hoc. ;)

Dammit, you're right. Regular users of homeopathy all die (eventually). There should be an enquiry.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Manioberoi, I have a tangent question:

Have there ever been tests between homeopaths to see which ones do best. Which individual homeopaths have the best track record? I know they give out prizes, but these don't say much about the results a homeopath achieves, but more about his/her popularity.

Could it be taught to a nurse or someone with a basic understanding of human physiology and disease? Or maybe to someone with very little knowledge of these?

What would you say is the basic skill of a homeopath?

I would also like to restate a question posted earlier (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2709425#post2709425) but which did not recieve a reply (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2711786#post2711786):
Some homeopathic pharmacies enjoy higher reputations than others. Sometimes accidental exposure to sunlight / radiation may cause problems. Also there are more than one protocols / methods in use and full standardisation has not been achieved so far.

To get round this problem if a remedy is rightly selected and does not act as expected either another batch is used or a different (better?) manufacturer is used.
:D
This is kind of like playing craps. You change the enchantment on the dice, ... You just keep throwing the dice 'till you get a seven. When you do... the therapy worked. When the patient gets impatient or starts to doubt the "therapy", you get rid of them by sending them to us. Is this how it works? Just curious...
If this still is a personalized optimalization of the remedy... Have there been tests of the difference in effect of the manufacturer or the batch used?

SYL :)
I can undertand your frustration.

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.

In homeopathy, provided a lower 'balancing' potency in the range of 6X to 6C (water) is used the effects are slow in coming up (for the first month) but the cure thereafter is increasingly perceptible and entirely without the kind of side effects stated above.

So even if the homeopath throws the dice successfully the seventh time (most good homeopaths manage it on the first or second throw) the patient will still be benefited more by homeopathy than by conventional medicne in a chronic disease.
"If this still is a personalized optimalization of the remedy... Have there been tests of the difference in effect of the manufacturer or the batch used?"

SYL :)

[krazyKemist]

In the Netherlands. 3 doctors have recently been suspended for life, they didn't cure their patient and did not offer the conventional treatment but agreed to let the patient get the alternative treatment elsewhere instead. The patient died. The civil suit is still pending. If there will be a criminal suit is not clear.

I highly object to experimenting on patients without proper argumentation and supporting basic research. Our patients are not labrats. There are reasons why we make our clinical trials follow the phase I step first. You do not want to expose patients to something that is potentially harmful or has no effect. Placing it at an equal standard to conventional effective drugs will give doctors the opportunity or even the obligation to consider this unproven drug or treatment above other treatments and thereby denies the patient the proven cure.

Observation in clinical cases that show an effect, may lead to further investigation. This is how sometimes unproven drugs are rolled into a medical experiment anyway to confirm the effects. If they succeed in repeating the effects, further research is done to identify why it works. If the effects are not repeated, the treatment is rejected, end of story. To get it back of the ground again, you have to start at the basis and show how it could work, a probable mechanism and go through the phase I trial after doing all the basic science leg work. If patients choose to use a drug or it's used in experimental conditions overlooked and approved by the ethics committee with proper medical evaluation and back-up care to step in if the trial goes wrong, then maybe this is something that can be discussed. There has to be a reason to try it first.

I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but the question: "can the effects of homeopathy be tested or not?", still stands.

SYL :)

True. You can't ethically test homeopathic remedies on patients whose life would be endangered by a delay in proper medication (ex.: cancer). However there is an exception in the law (in US at least) that permits it in terminal patients: compassionate use. It's been used before to allow testing on laetrile/amygdalin.

But barring that, the testing could be done on more bening illnesses, ex.: flu. I still can't see no reason testing couldn't be done. A 6 months test, as was proposed earlier, is not unusual for drugs. Testing costs would be greatly diminished if you consider that toxicity testing is not necessary, you don't need pharmacokinetics (nothing to measure there), AUC, ect. Basically, you remove all the costier lab work. What's left is writing a decent protocol for remedy/placebo preparation and tracking.

As to the funding matter, I'm not sure homeopathic remedy manufacturers are as poor as they would like us believe... I don't know how such things cost in India, but here in north america they're sold at a similar price to real medicine, and sometimes more !

the Kemist

[Gord_in_Toronto]

In the Netherlands. 3 doctors have recently been suspended for life, they didn't cure their patient and did not offer the conventional treatment but agreed to let the patient get the alternative treatment elsewhere instead. The patient died. The civil suit is still pending. If there will be a criminal suit is not clear.

I highly object to experimenting on patients without proper argumentation and supporting basic research. Our patients are not labrats. There are reasons why we make our clinical trials follow the phase I step first. You do not want to expose patients to something that is potentially harmful or has no effect. Placing it at an equal standard to conventional effective drugs will give doctors the opportunity or even the obligation to consider this unproven drug or treatment above other treatments and thereby denies the patient the proven cure.

Observation in clinical cases that show an effect, may lead to further investigation. This is how sometimes unproven drugs are rolled into a medical experiment anyway to confirm the effects. If they succeed in repeating the effects, further research is done to identify why it works. If the effects are not repeated, the treatment is rejected, end of story. To get it back of the ground again, you have to start at the basis and show how it could work, a probable mechanism and go through the phase I trial after doing all the basic science leg work. If patients choose to use a drug or it's used in experimental conditions overlooked and approved by the ethics committee with proper medical evaluation and back-up care to step in if the trial goes wrong, then maybe this is something that can be discussed. There has to be a reason to try it first.

I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but the question: "can the effects of homeopathy be tested or not?", still stands.

SYL :)

True. You can't ethically test homeopathic remedies on patients whose life would be endangered by a delay in proper medication (ex.: cancer). However there is an exception in the law (in US at least) that permits it in terminal patients: compassionate use. It's been used before to allow testing on laetrile/amygdalin.

But barring that, the testing could be done on more bening illnesses, ex.: flu. I still can't see no reason testing couldn't be done. A 6 months test, as was proposed earlier, is not unusual for drugs. Testing costs would be greatly diminished if you consider that toxicity testing is not necessary, you don't need pharmacokinetics (nothing to measure there), AUC, ect. Basically, you remove all the costier lab work. What's left is writing a decent protocol for remedy/placebo preparation and tracking.

As to the funding matter, I'm not sure homeopathic remedy manufacturers are as poor as they would like us believe... I don't know how such things cost in India, but here in north america they're sold at a similar price to real medicine, and sometimes more !

the Kemist

Adult, mentally compeptent patients always have the right to accept or reject treatment. Jehova's Witnesses regularly refuse blood transfusion. No one gets sued. Though, in the Dutch case, the issue seems to be that doctors were, err, mistaken about the efficacy about the "alternative" treatment they recommended.

Patients very often reject real medicine and stagger off to woo frauds to get phoney treatment. Where are the current users of homeopathy that have been cured of syphilis? If the quacks kept proper records, the proof would be available (or not, as the case may be). As it would be for any of the "alternative" cancer cures. :mad:

[SYLVESTER1592]

True. You can't ethically test homeopathic remedies on patients whose life would be endangered by a delay in proper medication (ex.: cancer). However there is an exception in the law (in US at least) that permits it in terminal patients: compassionate use. It's been used before to allow testing on laetrile/amygdalin.

In the Netherlands it is largely frowned upon in palliative care, but a trial as complementary treatment could be conceivable. As an alternative treatment, replacing pain medication, it is hardly ethical, so that in my opinion is a definite No No. I don't know how things works in the US and Canada, but I imagine the sentiment would be the same. Homeopaths in the Netherlands have told some of their patients after they had already left the hospital that paracetamol is enough to kill the pain in combination with the homeopathic treatment. To say this to a slowly dying terminal patient in severe pain... Well, I think you can imagine what I what I would like to do (and I'm not just talking about the patient).


But baring that, the testing could be done on more bening illnesses, ex.: flu. I still can't see no reason testing couldn't be done. A 6 months test, as was proposed earlier, is not unusual for drugs. Testing costs would be greatly diminished if you consider that toxicity testing is not necessary, you don't need pharmacokinetics (nothing to measure there), AUC, ect. Basically, you remove all the costier lab work. What's left is writing a decent protocol for remedy/placebo preparation and tracking.


Actually, you just mentioned an illness that will clear up by itself and for which there is no treatment of the cause but only supportive treatment. So test away...
The timeline of the test needs argumentation, as would the reason to treat a patient.
The argument is, you need to show that there is a reason to test a drug on a patient. The reason (most often) could be that laboratory test showed a promising effect of the drug on animals or cell culture. Another reason could be that the drug was designed for another illness but has shown a promising effect that had not been recognized before. Yet another reason could be that many case reports led to a small patient group presenting beneficial effects of an formerly unknown substance. This has happened in the case of homeopathy, but the following trials failed to show a conclusive or even promising result under careful scrutiny by peers in the medical world. This normally means further research is shelved. But you don't start testing on patients first and analyze later. That is something you do in the lab on animals or cell culture. Even if the new drug is only a derivative of a already known drug, testing normally starts in the lab. I understand very well that you believe it is all bunk and they are only getting water anyway, so there would be no problem. But by subjecting patients to a trial, they have to follow the trial protocol. This means the patients are subjected to tests and a regimen that is often an infringement on the normal care given by their physician. For a benign problem (something you would encounter in a General Practitioner's office on a Monday morning) this can probably be done and the burden of the trial can be minimized. For more serious disease it becomes another story and I would have serious problems with the reasons for such a trial.

In general: A drug that does not work in the lab, does not make it to the patient.

( On a side note: I think some of the few exceptions where shortcuts were taken and testing in humans started long before labtests were finished were trials done by Bayer in WWII and more recently trials done on HIV patients in Africa, but I think we can agree this should not be considered normal )

SYL :)

[SYLVESTER1592]

Adult, mentally compeptent patients always have the right to accept or reject treatment. Jehova's Witnesses regularly refuse blood transfusion. No one gets sued. Though, in the Dutch case, the issue seems to be that doctors were, err, mistaken about the efficacy about the "alternative" treatment they recommended.


True. I think you are right about that.

However, we also have the WGBO, this is a law that regulates the agreement between patients and doctors about their treatment. It has a lot of duties for doctors, but one right. The right to determine the treatment for the patient. If the doctor decides to give blood anyway in case of emergency, he can't be touched. In general any doctor will do everything to keep their word to their patient. The Jehova's in the Netherlands have already stated that if the doctor makes this decision against their wishes they will accept it, but they can not accept it in advance, willingly. Doctors try to take other precautions to avoid giving blood and choose conditions that will avoid the necessity of supplementing blood. If he refuses to give blood because of the patient's religion this needs to be recorded, argumented and defended. He can still be judged by his peers.

SYL :)

[Gord_in_Toronto]

True. I think you are right about that.

However, we also have the WGBO, this is a law that regulates the agreement between patients and doctors about their treatment. It has a lot of duties for doctors, but one right. The right to determine the treatment for the patient. If the doctor decides to give blood anyway in case of emergency, he can't be touched. In general any doctor will do everything to keep their word to their patient. The Jehova's in the Netherlands have already stated that if the doctor makes this decision against their wishes they will accept it, but they can not accept it in advance, willingly. Doctors try to take other precautions to avoid giving blood and choose conditions that will avoid the necessity of supplementing blood. If he refuses to give blood because of the patient's religion this needs to be recorded, argumented and defended. He can still be judged by his peers.

SYL :)

Ah. TWIVP (the World is a Very Big Place). This is a very much different legal approach than in Canada. Even in the case of the children of JWs, there has to be a court order transfering responsibilty of the children to the state. The law does make an exception in the case of a life threatening emergency, however.

If only the wooish altmed providers kept good records, some of their claims could be tested. I wonder why they don't maintain such records? :rolleyes:

[krazyKemist]

In the Netherlands it is largely frowned upon in palliative care, but a trial as complementary treatment could be conceivable. As an alternative treatment, replacing pain medication, it is hardly ethical, so that in my opinion is a definite No No. I don't know how things works in the US and Canada, but I imagine the sentiment would be the same. Homeopaths in the Netherlands have told some of their patients after they had already left the hospital that paracetamol is enough to kill the pain in combination with the homeopathic treatment. To say this to a slowly dying terminal patient in severe pain... Well, I think you can imagine what I what I would like to do (and I'm not just talking about the patient).


Actually, you just mentioned an illness that will clear up by itself and for which there is no treatment of the cause but only supportive treatment. So test away...
The timeline of the test needs argumentation, as would the reason to treat a patient.
The argument is, you need to show that there is a reason to test a drug on a patient. The reason (most often) could be that laboratory test showed a promising effect of the drug on animals or cell culture. Another reason could be that the drug was designed for another illness but has shown a promising effect that had not been recognized before. Yet another reason could be that many case reports led to a small patient group presenting beneficial effects of an formerly unknown substance. This has happened in the case of homeopathy, but the following trials failed to show a conclusive or even promising result under careful scrutiny by peers in the medical world. This normally means further research is shelved. But you don't start testing on patients first and analyze later. That is something you do in the lab on animals or cell culture. Even if the new drug is only a derivative of a already known drug, testing normally starts in the lab. I understand very well that you believe it is all bunk and they are only getting water anyway, so there would be no problem. But by subjecting patients to a trial, they have to follow the trial protocol. This means the patients are subjected to tests and a regimen that is often an infringement on the normal care given by their physician. For a benign problem (something you would encounter in a General Practitioner's office on a Monday morning) this can probably be done and the burden of the trial can be minimized. For more serious disease it becomes another story and I would have serious problems with the reasons for such a trial.

In general: A drug that does not work in the lab, does not make it to the patient.

( On a side note: I think some of the few exceptions where shortcuts were taken and testing in humans started long before labtests were finished were trials done by Bayer in WWII and more recently trials done on HIV patients in Africa, but I think we can agree this should not be considered normal )

SYL :)

Things work a little differently in US and Canada (actually, canadian drugs are usually FDA-tested; they are then approved about 5 years after US approval, without any additional testing). And laetrile assays were not that conclusive in the lab, in addition to suspision about a serious risk of cyanide toxicity... I guess popular pressure is what actually pushed that protocol. I'm not particularly fond of this kind of thing myself. After all, even after showing that 1) it didn't work and 2) it did have cyanide toxicity, laetrile is still one of the most popular cancer-related health fraud.

But consider testing the homeopathic remedy for flu in about the same way as tamiflu and relenza (flu antiviral therapies). What those do is that they shorten the actual period of time/severity of flu symptoms. Same test, without the need for toxicology/pharmacokinetics. Financed by a homeopathic remedy manufacturer.

oh, I know it won't stop the homeopathy trade. They'll have a lot of fighting over the way the remedy was made, that results were loaded against them by pharmas and new wacky theories as to why the test cannot be right, ect. But maybe, just maybe, it'll open some eyes.

the Kemist

[krazyKemist]

If only the wooish altmed providers kept good records, some of their claims could be tested. I wonder why they don't maintain such records? :rolleyes:

Well, duh. :D

the Kemist

[fls]

But consider testing the homeopathic remedy for flu in about the same way as tamiflu and relenza (flu antiviral therapies). What those do is that they shorten the actual period of time/severity of flu symptoms. Same test, without the need for toxicology/pharmacokinetics. Financed by a homeopathic remedy manufacturer.

oh, I know it won't stop the homeopathy trade. They'll have a lot of fighting over the way the remedy was made, that results were loaded against them by pharmas and new wacky theories as to why the test cannot be right, ect. But maybe, just maybe, it'll open some eyes.

the Kemist

Like these?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=retrieve&db=pubmed&list_uids=2655683&dopt=Abstract
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B8CWK-4MDGN8F-3&_user=10&_coverDate=04%2F30%2F1998&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=595be723c5173e8b1cbaa97deb3ea544
http://www.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab001957.html

Linda

[manioberoi]

No, you repeat the same supposed treatment over and over again. When it fails, you let conventional medicine fix the problem. When you succeed by chance, you say the new medication did the trick. If there is a chance of the problem clearing up without any help, you take the credit.

You have to show the benefit of what you offer, objectively, controllable, not make believe. If you can not do that, conventional medicine will not accept it. The effect of the physician is always there and plays a big part in the perception of the patient, but the real reason they get better is because they are offered a cure. Demonstrate in a controlled trial, that homeopathy can objectively offer that cure. Repeat it, make it reproducable, so other doctors can be certain they have a cure they can trust. So far homeopathy has failed on all fronts in basic science and in clinical trials.

Why doesn't this worry you...
Trying homeopathy first is not safe because it has no side-effects, it is potentially dangerous because it offers no real benifits to conventional medicine thereby postponing treatment and aggravating the patients condition.

Can you subscribe to that?

SYL :)
That is correct.

[manioberoi]

To the risk of repeating myself (and other people here), there is no need for a chemical analysis at this time. If you can prove that it works, using a double blind experiment with a placebo, then we can begin to work on what could be happening physically in the dilution ! Working the other way around is a loss of time and money, especially as we would have to look at an unknown piece of physics/chemistry !

An acceptable placebo would have to be unidentifiable by both the tester and patient as such. Plain, double-distilled, or reverse-osmosed water, the very same that is used for the dilutions without succussion, would be all right for me. Would it be for you ?

the Kemist
Yes.

[SYLVESTER1592]

That is correct.

:D Do you realize what you just agreed with? I hope you do.

I'm glad. I guess this means you are leaving homeopathy behind until there may be some compelling evidence and reason to look at it again in a different light.

Thank you

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

Especially since Dana Ullman claims that homeopathy is a viable treatment for HIV/AIDS:
Controlled clinical trials evaluating the homeopathic treatment of people with human immunodeficiency virus or acquired immune deficiency syndrome. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=12676041&ordinalpos=4&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum)

He really needs to answer to this claim!

Dana Ullman has NOT claimed that homeopathy has a viable treatment or cure for HIV/AIDS. So far neither does conventional medicine claim to have a cure for HIV/AIDS.

All that Dana Ullman has said is that Homeopathic treatment holds promise for such cure / treatment and proper trials need to be carried out so as to establish this. He has at no time stated that patients should abandon conventional treatment and look for homeopathic treatment for HIV/AIDS.

Do you find this objectionable?

[manioberoi]

:D Do you realize what you just agreed with? I hope you do.

I'm glad. I guess this means you are leaving homeopathy behind until there may be some compelling evidence and reason to look at it again in a different light.

Thank you

SYL :)
Oops!That was meant for the post by kemist.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Oops!That was meant for the post by kemist.
:D Yeah, I thought so

I never saw it happen before and it really sounded too good to be true :D

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

It would need to be a test of treatment of the same condition in each case. Trials would need to be sufficiently large (I'm sure someone else with more expertise will tell us how large they should be), and I'm afraid you couldn't do all the replications yourself. They would need independent replication by someone unconnected with you. Oh, and they would all need to be published...;)

If all those conditions were met, I would be well on the way to being convinced that there was indeed something in it (even though there is nothing in it...).

I'm sorry, you can't use the excuse "we can't afford to do trials". Many trials HAVE been done. They have either been of low quality, had negative results, or been one of the few flukes to show positive results.

No, you repeat the same supposed treatment over and over again. When it fails, you let conventional medicine fix the problem. When you succeed by chance, you say the new medication did the trick. If there is a chance of the problem clearing up without any help, you take the credit.

You have to show the benefit of what you offer, objectively, controllable, not make believe. If you can not do that, conventional medicine will not accept it. The effect of the physician is always there and plays a big part in the perception of the patient, but the real reason they get better is because they are offered a cure. Demonstrate in a controlled trial, that homeopathy can objectively offer that cure. Repeat it, make it reproducable, so other doctors can be certain they have a cure they can trust. So far homeopathy has failed on all fronts in basic science and in clinical trials.

Why doesn't this worry you...
Trying homeopathy first is not safe because it has no side-effects, it is potentially dangerous because it offers no real benifits to conventional medicine thereby postponing treatment and aggravating the patients condition.

Can you subscribe to that?

SYL :)


I am beginning to understand your objections and I sort of get the feeling that you are genuinely concerned that homeopathic remedies do nothing, perhaps the homeopaths have great convincing powers - I can assure you that most homeopaths are not good at convincing people - they prescribe for 100 to 150 people daily, at least 80 percent come again, get better / benefit, are cured etc. Homeopaths do not get the severely ill cases except those told to go home and wait for....good homeopaths send the serious cases for conventional medical consultation in the first instance.

Where is the time to conduct strict trials? Homeopaths traditionally were trained in conducting provings NOT double blind trials. That seems to be changing but ever so slowly. The Government of India is pouring money into reaching homeopathy across the breadth and length of India. And a very very small amount is being spent on training homeopaths to conduct double blind trials - but I wonder if they are aware that a flu trial or a diarhhoea trial could backfire, since these are inherently self limiting conditions.

So the right kind of homeopathically treatable conditions (which will also not be life threatening conditions - at least to start with) say chronic arthritis of the small joints - fingers, toes and wrists with Caulophyllum 6C water potency repeated as required over 6 months (maximum once daily - repetition to be decided by homeopath on homeopathic indications) DNA sample be obtained at start and end of trial from control and trial group.

9 such trials starting every 15 days, with small groups (10 to 12?) to cut the cost and learn how to avoid bias, errors, fraud etc.

Cost would be high but reasonable.

[manioberoi]

Since this still isn't an answer to the question, I will ask again:

Quote: "The rest of the physical world is certainly applicable".
What does that mean?
1) the rest of the world is applicable: you choose to apply the world??? I recon this qoute was ment in a different way. Please correct it or explain.
2) There are non-physical influences? What are they? Do you have evidence of them?
Quote:"physical ONLY as in "chemical composition" of the diluted remedy beyond 12C or 24X.
1)What non-physical evidence proves homeopathy works?

can the effects of homoeopathy be tested or not?

Straight forward answer please. Explain why or why not...

SYL :)
Proof of effect of remedy has to be physically verifiable in the patient. Remedy must be certified by the manufacturer and his process of manufacture be open to third party audit and the same standards should be applied to conventional medicine.

[SYLVESTER1592]

<snip>...
So the right kind of homeopathically treatable conditions (which will also not be life threatening conditions - at least to start with) say chronic arthritis of the small joints - fingers, toes and wrists with Caulophyllum 6C water potency repeated as required over 6 months (maximum once daily - repetition to be decided by homeopath on homeopathic indications) DNA sample be obtained at start and end of trial from control and trial group.

9 such trials starting every 15 days, with small groups (10 to 12?) to cut the cost and learn how to avoid bias, errors, fraud etc.

Cost would be high but reasonable.

Why DNA? Not ANA serology (or RF auto-antibodies)? Just curious...

Thought of taking an X-ray? What other tests would you do?...

SYL :)

[SYLVESTER1592]

Proof of effect of remedy has to be physically verifiable in the patient. Remedy must be certified by the manufacturer and his process of manufacture be open to third party audit and the same standards should be applied to conventional medicine.
OK, so your answer is YES
I think similar conditions apply to conventional medicine, but they have basic research that backs up the mechanism of action. I know you think this is nitpicking, but it enhances the value of the results achieved from a trial.

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

Yep. Definitely delving into conspiracy theory:( . That is a more than a little disappointing.

As we're speaking of monetary interest, do you think homeopaths would benefit if homeopathy is once and for all proven to be only placebo ?

the Kemist
There is no conspiracy. Its all about money.

Homeopaths would lose but the public would lose much much more.

1 in 100 people using homeopathy always go to a homeopath for the remedy. The rest only consult a homeopath for an intractable problem and use the remedy kits for routine problems.

[manioberoi]

Clinical trials for homeopathic remedies would be a lot cheaper. A read through of "An introduction to clinical trials (http://clinicaltrials.gov/ct/info/resources)". For the Phase II trials they sum it up as "the experimental study drug or treatment is given to a larger group of people (100-300) to see if it is effective and to further evaluate its safety." (my bold). Repeat a couple of times to ensure the results are correct and you'll still have change from half a million, and given how much profit the manufacturers and manufacturers do make a year there must be a reason why the excuses get dragged out every time.
If you follow the thread you will see that what you are suggesting is unsuited to a double blind homeopathic trial.

[manioberoi]

In the Netherlands. 3 doctors have recently been suspended for life, they didn't cure their patient and did not offer the conventional treatment but agreed to let the patient get the alternative treatment elsewhere instead. The patient died. The civil suit is still pending. If there will be a criminal suit is not clear.

I highly object to experimenting on patients without proper argumentation and supporting basic research. Our patients are not labrats. There are reasons why we make our clinical trials follow the phase I step first. You do not want to expose patients to something that is potentially harmful or has no effect. Placing it at an equal standard to conventional effective drugs will give doctors the opportunity or even the obligation to consider this unproven drug or treatment above other treatments and thereby denies the patient the proven cure.

Observation in clinical cases that show an effect, may lead to further investigation. This is how sometimes unproven drugs are rolled into a medical experiment anyway to confirm the effects. If they succeed in repeating the effects, further research is done to identify why it works. If the effects are not repeated, the treatment is rejected, end of story. To get it back of the ground again, you have to start at the basis and show how it could work, a probable mechanism and go through the phase I trial after doing all the basic science leg work. If patients choose to use a drug or it's used in experimental conditions overlooked and approved by the ethics committee with proper medical evaluation and back-up care to step in if the trial goes wrong, then maybe this is something that can be discussed. There has to be a reason to try it first.

I don't want to step on anyone's toes, but the question: "can the effects of homeopathy be tested or not?", still stands.

SYL :)
High ethical standards demand that patients rights be respected.

Agreed that effects of homeopathic remedies on patients need be tested.

Since homeopathy works, there is absolute certainty that its effects can be tested.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Since homeopathy works, there is absolute certainty that its effects can be tested.

Saying that it works does not make it so...
Either present the proof or retract the statement. I think by now you understand what we mean by proof.

SYL :)

[SYLVESTER1592]

High ethical standards demand that patients rights be respected.


We have legalized abortion and even allow active euthanasia at the patients request.
I think their rights are respected just fine over here, so I think you got the wrong adversary again. They also have the right to proper care and that's not what you are presenting.

SYL :)

[Pipirr]

High ethical standards demand that patients rights be respected.

Agreed that effects of homeopathic remedies on patients need be tested.

Since homeopathy works, there is absolute certainty that its effects can be tested.


How can you be so certain?

[Dave_46]

I am beginning to understand your objections and I sort of get the feeling that you are genuinely concerned that homeopathic remedies do nothing, perhaps the homeopaths have great convincing powers - I can assure you that most homeopaths are not good at convincing people - they prescribe for 100 to 150 people daily, at least 80 percent come again, get better / benefit, are cured etc. Homeopaths do not get the severely ill cases except those told to go home and wait for....good homeopaths send the serious cases for conventional medical consultation in the first instance.

<snip>

I left that sentence complete, because I don't like cutting sentences when I quote them. I am referring to the bit in the middle about the number of people treated daily. To "prescribe" for 100 people, and assuming an eight hour working day, that gives less than 5 minutes per consultation. For 150, just over 3 minutes. Is this correct?

Dave

[SYLVESTER1592]

So the right kind of homeopathically treatable conditions (which will also not be life threatening conditions - at least to start with) say chronic arthritis of the small joints - fingers, toes and wrists with Caulophyllum 6C water potency repeated as required over 6 months (maximum once daily - repetition to be decided by homeopath on homeopathic indications) DNA sample be obtained at start and end of trial from control and trial group.

9 such trials starting every 15 days, with small groups (10 to 12?) to cut the cost and learn how to avoid bias, errors, fraud etc.

Cost would be high but reasonable.

The reason why I'm bugging you about this is because rheumatology is not a easy subject in internal medicine. You might want to think this over...
First look at all the known causes of arthritis then start limiting and start designing your trial to cater to a specific disease or cause.
I know this is hard to work around to, because you are used to reason from a symptom as your main viewpoint. You could choose a symptom with a shorter differential diagnosis. Just a suggestion...

SYL

[manioberoi]

Why DNA? Not ANA serology (or RF auto-antibodies)? Just curious...

Thought of taking an X-ray? What other tests would you do?...

SYL :)
ANA Serology would only be indicative of autoimmune disorder RA - here we are trying to set up a protocol that is repeatable.

If the hypothesis that homeopathy cures at the core level of cell biology is true then we should be able to find very minute beneficial changes in DNA (eg lenghthening of telomeres).

Xrays are harmful in excess and to be avoided unless essential for diagnosis - use here not considered ethical.

[manioberoi]

No, the lactose in the sugar pills. You were using this as a reason for using liquid preparations rather than pills, remember.

Incidentally, your objection to the use of alcohol in the preparation doesn't stand: as long as the placebo was made from the same solvent as the remedy, it would smell the same as the remedy.
alcoholus is a homeopathic remedy so is sac lac. Pure water is not - so far.

[SYLVESTER1592]

ANA Serology would only be indicative of autoimmune disorder RA - here we are trying to set up a protocol that is repeatable.

If the hypothesis that homeopathy cures at the core level of cell biology is true then we should be able to find very minute beneficial changes in DNA (eg lenghthening of telomeres).

Xrays are harmful in excess and to be avoided unless essential for diagnosis - use here not considered ethical.
???

Have you ever taken a plane somewhere? Do you know how much radiation you already have received? We are not aiming at overies or testikels and you are using it at the beginning and end of the trial to make the diagnosis and evaluate progression, so that is perfectly ethical.

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

Caution: that's conspiracy theory, that is. Remember ? "good journals are controlled by big bad pharmas ?";)

If we start in this direction, we'll have to move this thread, you know.

the Kemist

Applying the standards of proof that homoeopathy uses, we've established that it's fatal in this very thread (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2695314#post2695314)!

Post hoc ergo propter hoc. ;)

That does not even meet the "homeopathic standards" as perceived by you - can be discounted.

Conventional medicine kills millions by way of iatrogenic disease every year.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Conventional medicine kills millions by way of iatrogenic disease every year.

What do you base that on? What do you consider iatrogenic?

SYL:)

[manioberoi]

Manioberoi, I have a tangent question:

Have there ever been tests between homeopaths to see which ones do best. Which individual homeopaths have the best track record? I know they give out prizes, but these don't say much about the results a homeopath achieves, but more about his/her popularity.

NOT PUBLISHED


Could it be taught to a nurse or someone with a basic understanding of human physiology and disease? Or maybe to someone with very little knowledge of these?

NO

What would you say is the basic skill of a homeopath?

Empathy Consultation Symptom Pathology Repertory Materia medica Follow up Ethical Legal

I would also like to restate a question posted earlier (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2709425#post2709425) but which did not recieve a reply (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2711786#post2711786):



"If this still is a personalized optimalization of the remedy... Have there been tests of the difference in effect of the manufacturer or the batch used?"

NONE PUBLISHED SO FAR

SYL :)

See in blue above for reply.

[SYLVESTER1592]

ANA Serology would only be indicative of autoimmune disorder RA - here we are trying to set up a protocol that is repeatable.

If the hypothesis that homeopathy cures at the core level of cell biology is true then we should be able to find very minute beneficial changes in DNA (eg lenghthening of telomeres).


I conclude from this that you will be looking at hand osteoarthritis. I think you should know that the DNA differences in leukocyte telomere length that are seen have only been published recently. You would be using a method that has been around for a little while.

Do you regard this as the golden standard.

Did you consider that?

(Adding a link to the article (http://press.psprings.co.uk/ard/october/ar56903.pdf))
BTW in regard of the X-ray comment, I seriously do hope that you were not thinking of evaluating DNA from chondrocytes...
Second: maybe you should consider this (link) (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=17114192&ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum) it may clarify why diagnosis is important for your method to work. Maybe reconsider other tests I mentioned.

SYL :)

[SYLVESTER1592]

See in blue above for reply.
Could you expand on that a little?...

[manioberoi]

True. You can't ethically test homeopathic remedies on patients whose life would be endangered by a delay in proper medication (ex.: cancer). However there is an exception in the law (in US at least) that permits it in terminal patients: compassionate use. It's been used before to allow testing on laetrile/amygdalin.

But barring that, the testing could be done on more bening illnesses, ex.: flu. I still can't see no reason testing couldn't be done. A 6 months test, as was proposed earlier, is not unusual for drugs. Testing costs would be greatly diminished if you consider that toxicity testing is not necessary, you don't need pharmacokinetics (nothing to measure there), AUC, ect. Basically, you remove all the costier lab work. What's left is writing a decent protocol for remedy/placebo preparation and tracking.

As to the funding matter, I'm not sure homeopathic remedy manufacturers are as poor as they would like us believe... I don't know how such things cost in India, but here in north america they're sold at a similar price to real medicine, and sometimes more !

the Kemist
Not that they are poor. Just that the trials would not make any one of them richer than the others since there can be no patent on single remedies.

Flu and diarhhoea and any other self limiting diseases be NOT taken up for homeopathic trials as expressed in this thread.

[manioberoi]

Adult, mentally compeptent patients always have the right to accept or reject treatment. Jehova's Witnesses regularly refuse blood transfusion. No one gets sued. Though, in the Dutch case, the issue seems to be that doctors were, err, mistaken about the efficacy about the "alternative" treatment they recommended.

Patients very often reject real medicine and stagger off to woo frauds to get phoney treatment. Where are the current users of homeopathy that have been cured of syphilis? If the quacks kept proper records, the proof would be available (or not, as the case may be). As it would be for any of the "alternative" cancer cures. :mad:
The records are anecdotal. There were no controls you see.

[SYLVESTER1592]

The records are anecdotal. There were no controls you see.
I think you mean there were no consistent recordings of ALL patients that were treated. Controls is a research term... not what this is about.

SYL :)

[Gord_in_Toronto]

The records are anecdotal. There were no controls you see.

There do not have to be any controls, there just have to be good records. Patient presents to doctor or quack with diagnosed illness. Is treated and results noted. Rate of recovery is compared to rate of recovery known from population statistics.

Quacks do not keep any data but depend on anecdotes. Dead patients do not report in.

[manioberoi]

How can you be so certain?
6 Polo ponies stationed 500 kms away, that I have never seen - veterinary treatment over 3 months of 1 failed - treated homeopathically on indications reported by owner(s) ( as advised by veterinary). Later 5 more cases- ALL 6 recovered. Veterinary now wants to learn homeopathy!! But veterinary homeopathy is not recognised in India. ( Steroidal autoimmune disorders, worms not removed by conventional drugs came out in numbers (40 to 50)with 10 days of Cina 6c, repeated ligament injuries cured and stopped recurrence using ACTH 6C followed by Ruta 6C- these are verifiable from the owners some of whom I have only spoken on phone but never met).

I have been cured among other problems of a slipped disc in 2005- back was bent sideways and forwards ( confirmed by specialist of AIIMS) with 5 days of Hypericum perforatrum 6C followed by 5 days of Calcarea carbonica 6C) - I could walk straight on the fourth day.

56 year old lady suffering from arthritis and high BP taking losacar for 10 years - treated homeopathically - BP 120/80 - no drugs, arthritis cured, took part in public dance performance last week.

Post brain tapeworm infestation (treated conventionally) lesion in MRI - treated homeopathically - cleared up in 30 days as seen in MRI - a polo player whose horse was cured.

These are all recent cases.

There were no controls. Was it all a fluke? For every case cured there is one that is only partially or not at all benefited - but homeopathy has its limitations - coffee, tobacco, environment etc.

The diagnosis is done conventionally. The treatment is by homeopathic analysis.

That is how I am so sure.

Let's get on with finding a way to get these trials properly designed.

Once that has been done we can find out who is going to organise the trials so that there is no question of adverse comment either from the homeopaths or from the practitioners of conventional medicine, whichever way the trial goes. It won't be the end of homeopathy or for that matter of any of the pathys. They would meander on as usual.

[manioberoi]

I think you mean there were no consistent recordings of ALL patients that were treated. Controls is a research term... not what this is about.

SYL :)
That is true. Only the cured cases were highlighted in the literature. The others remained unpublished in the records and are lost. In those days the conventional doctors were the best homeopaths and they had no such problem as they could switch back and forth if the patient demanded.

Todays homeopaths are not as meticulous about records as they should be - because patients switch back and forth and the mixture can become difficult to analyse.

Maybe homeopaths should start by keeping better records and informing the patient what remedy is administered (most do not tell ).

[SYLVESTER1592]

6 Polo ponies stationed 500 kms away, that I have never seen - veterinary treatment over 3 months of 1 failed - treated homeopathically on indications reported by owner(s) ( as advised by veterinary). Later 5 more cases- ALL 6 recovered. Veterinary now wants to learn homeopathy!! But veterinary homeopathy is not recognised in India. ( Steroidal autoimmune disorders, worms not removed by conventional drugs came out in numbers (40 to 50)with 10 days of Cina 6c, repeated ligament injuries cured and stopped recurrence using ACTH 6C followed by Ruta 6C- these are verifiable from the owners some of whom I have only spoken on phone but never met).

I have been cured among other problems of a slipped disc in 2005- back was bent sideways and forwards ( confirmed by specialist of AIIMS) with 5 days of Hypericum perforatrum 6C followed by 5 days of Calcarea carbonica 6C) - I could walk straight on the fourth day.

56 year old lady suffering from arthritis and high BP taking losacar for 10 years - treated homeopathically - BP 120/80 - no drugs, arthritis cured, took part in public dance performance last week.

Post brain tapeworm infestation (treated conventionally) lesion in MRI - treated homeopathically - cleared up in 30 days as seen in MRI - a polo player whose horse was cured.

These are all recent cases.

There were no controls. Was it all a fluke? For every case cured there is one that is only partially or not at all benefited - but homeopathy has its limitations - coffee, tobacco, environment etc.

The diagnosis is done conventionally. The treatment is by homeopathic analysis.

That is how I am so sure.

Let's get on with finding a way to get these trials properly designed.

Once that has been done we can find out who is going to organise the trials so that there is no question of adverse comment either from the homeopaths or from the practitioners of conventional medicine, whichever way the trial goes. It won't be the end of homeopathy or for that matter of any of the pathys. They would meander on as usual.
I thought you understood what we consider proof....?
As this will only serve to "prove"that homeopathy works in your opinion and a negative result does not mean anything to you, why do you want to do the trial?

You do the trial to make up your own mind and advance the knowledge in your profession...Not for us. We couldn't care less at this point.

If there was some evidence of homeopathy working, we would pay attention, but don't do it for us...

Do you understand what I'm saying?

SYL :)

[SYLVESTER1592]

In those days the conventional doctors were the best homeopaths and they had no such problem as they could switch back and forth if the patient demanded.

:D That's funny... :D

Decades ago modern medicine was non-existent. This explains the rise of homeopathy in it's early years. Compared to modern medicine homeopathy lacks on many fronts.

Explanation: Conventional/ Modern medicine improves itself, homeopathy is rigidly fixed to what the good book says.

Do you see the difference?

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

I thought you understood what we consider proof....?
As this will only serve to "prove"that homeopathy works in your opinion and a negative result does not mean anything to you, why do you want to do the trial?

You do the trial to make up your own mind and advance the knowledge in your profession...Not for us. We couldn't care less at this point.

If there was some evidence of homeopathy working, we would pay attention, but don't do it for us...

Do you understand what I'm saying?

SYL :)
Not for your consumption. Others are also entitled to a reply.

"Originally Posted by Pipirr
How can you be so certain? "

[manioberoi]

I left that sentence complete, because I don't like cutting sentences when I quote them. I am referring to the bit in the middle about the number of people treated daily. To "prescribe" for 100 people, and assuming an eight hour working day, that gives less than 5 minutes per consultation. For 150, just over 3 minutes. Is this correct?

Dave
Absolutely.
I do not subscribe to this kind of homeopathy. But given the acute shortage of homeopaths I guess these homeopaths cannot turn away all but the 25 to 30 patients that a homeopath should ideally consult in a day if a fourth of them are new cases requiring 45 minutes to an hour each.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Not for your consumption. Others are also entitled to a reply.

"Originally Posted by Pipirr
How can you be so certain? "
I'm sorry, but I asked the same question. If you have another reply for me that is different...

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

The reason why I'm bugging you about this is because rheumatology is not a easy subject in internal medicine. You might want to think this over...
First look at all the known causes of arthritis then start limiting and start designing your trial to cater to a specific disease or cause.
I know this is hard to work around to, because you are used to reason from a symptom as your main viewpoint. You could choose a symptom with a shorter differential diagnosis. Just a suggestion...

SYL
Symptoms precede pathology in homeopathy for the good reason that the homeopathic remedy is designed to produce an artificial disease to activate the [vital force - black box] to drive out the real disease- so Caulophyllum 6C water potency for chronic arthritis of the small joints - fingers, toes and wrists . At times pathological approach ie use of Oxalicum acidum 6C water potency may work better but the percentage of cures would be expected to be higher with Caulophyllum 6C water potency than with Oxalicum acidum 6C water potency.

If I had to assure a 100 percent cure I may need to try another 4 to 5 remedies in the absence of knowledge of the underlying pathology.

Tests for underlying pathology would certainly help to shorten the selection process but only after Caulophyllum 6C water potency fails.

That in very simplistic terms is a short answer to your query.

Having treated different arthritic cases I stand by the suggestion.

[SYLVESTER1592]

Symptoms precede pathology in homeopathy for the good reason that the homeopathic remedy is designed to produce an artificial disease to activate the [vital force - black box] to drive out the real disease- so Caulophyllum 6C water potency for chronic arthritis of the small joints - fingers, toes and wrists . At times pathological approach ie use of Oxalicum acidum 6C water potency may work better but the percentage of cures would be expected to be higher with Caulophyllum 6C water potency than with Oxalicum acidum 6C water potency.

If I had to assure a 100 percent cure I may need to try another 4 to 5 remedies in the absence of knowledge of the underlying pathology.

Tests for underlying pathology would certainly help to shorten the selection process but only after Caulophyllum 6C water potency fails.

That in very simplistic terms is a short answer to your query.

Having treated different arthritic cases I stand by the suggestion.
Then I'm afraid you already have the first criticism to your trial (and maybe even the reason of rejection) before you even started, but keep on reading it may clarify why.

Good Luck

SYL :)

[manioberoi]

I'm sorry, but I asked the same question. If you have another reply for me that is different...

SYL :)
Sorry, I could not find it in this thread.
Could you help me to trace your question about how I "can be so certain?"

[SYLVESTER1592]

Sorry, I could not find it in this thread.
Could you help me to trace your question about how I "can be so certain?"
Post # 618

[manioberoi]

???

Have you ever taken a plane somewhere? Do you know how much radiation you already have received? We are not aiming at overies or testikels and you are using it at the beginning and end of the trial to make the diagnosis and evaluate progression, so that is perfectly ethical.

SYL :)
Dual energy X-ray absorptiometry could be used to advantage.

[manioberoi]

Saying that it works does not make it so...
Either present the proof or retract the statement. I think by now you understand what we mean by proof.

SYL :)
See:

Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.
"Inhibition of chemically induced carcinogenesis by drugs used in homeopathic medicine.
Kumar KH, Sunila ES, Kuttan G, Preethi KC, Venugopal CN, Kuttan R.
Amala Cancer Research Centre, Amala Nagar, Thrissur, Kerala State, India. 680555. amalaresearch@rediffmail.com.

Homeopathy is considered as one modality for cancer therapy. However, there are only very few clinical reports on the activity of the drugs, as well as in experimental animals. Presently we have evaluated the inhibitory effects of potentized homeopathic preparations against N'-nitrosodiethylamine (NDEA) induced hepatocellular carcinoma in rats as well as 3-methylcholanthrene-induced sarcomas in mice. We have used Ruta, Hydrastis, Lycopodium and Thuja, which are commonly employed in homeopathy for treating cancer. Administration of NDEA in rats resulted in tumor induction in the liver and elevated marker enzymes such as gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase, glutamate pyruvate transaminase, glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase and alkaline phosphatase in the serum and in liver. Concomitant administration of homeopathic drugs retarded the tumor growth and significantly reduced the elevated marker enzymes level as revealed by morphological, biochemical and histopathological evaluation. Out of the four drugs studied, Ruta 200c showed maximum inhibition of liver tumor development. Ruta 200c and phosphorus 1M were found to reduce the incidence of 3-methylcholanthrene-induced sarcomas and also increase the life span of mice harboring the tumours. These studies demonstrate that homeopathic drugs, at ultra low doses, may be able to decrease tumor induction by carcinogen administration. At present we do not know the mechanisms of action of these drugs useful against carcinogenesis."

[manioberoi]

Then I'm afraid you already have the first criticism to your trial (and maybe even the reason of rejection) before you even started, but keep on reading it may clarify why.

Good Luck

SYL :)
I am willing to listen and learn.

[manioberoi]

I conclude from this that you will be looking at hand osteoarthritis. I think you should know that the DNA differences in leukocyte telomere length that are seen have only been published recently. You would be using a method that has been around for a little while.

Do you regard this as the golden standard.

Did you consider that?

(Adding a link to the article (http://press.psprings.co.uk/ard/october/ar56903.pdf))
BTW in regard of the X-ray comment, I seriously do hope that you were not thinking of evaluating DNA from chondrocytes...
Second: maybe you should consider this (link) (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?Db=pubmed&Cmd=ShowDetailView&TermToSearch=17114192&ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum) it may clarify why diagnosis is important for your method to work. Maybe reconsider other tests I mentioned.

SYL :)
Thanks. Agree , also Xray as suggested.

[Gord_in_Toronto]

6 Polo ponies stationed 500 kms away, that I have never seen - veterinary treatment over 3 months of 1 failed - treated homeopathically on indications reported by owner(s) ( as advised by veterinary). Later 5 more cases- ALL 6 recovered. Veterinary now wants to learn homeopathy!! But veterinary homeopathy is not recognised in India. ( Steroidal autoimmune disorders, worms not removed by conventional drugs came out in numbers (40 to 50)with 10 days of Cina 6c, repeated ligament injuries cured and stopped recurrence using ACTH 6C followed by Ruta 6C- these are verifiable from the owners some of whom I have only spoken on phone but never met).

I have been cured among other problems of a slipped disc in 2005- back was bent sideways and forwards ( confirmed by specialist of AIIMS) with 5 days of Hypericum perforatrum 6C followed by 5 days of Calcarea carbonica 6C) - I could walk straight on the fourth day.

56 year old lady suffering from arthritis and high BP taking losacar for 10 years - treated homeopathically - BP 120/80 - no drugs, arthritis cured, took part in public dance performance last week.

Post brain tapeworm infestation (treated conventionally) lesion in MRI - treated homeopathically - cleared up in 30 days as seen in MRI - a polo player whose horse was cured.

These are all recent cases.

There were no controls. Was it all a fluke? For every case cured there is one that is only partially or not at all benefited - but homeopathy has its limitations - coffee, tobacco, environment etc.

The diagnosis is done conventionally. The treatment is by homeopathic analysis.

That is how I am so sure.

Let's get on with finding a way to get these trials properly designed.

Once that has been done we can find out who is going to organise the trials so that there is no question of adverse comment either from the homeopaths or from the practitioners of conventional medicine, whichever way the trial goes. It won't be the end of homeopathy or for that matter of any of the pathys. They would meander on as usual.

We know that "spontaneous remission" actually happens. Diseases are cured without intervention by anybody. If I collect anedotal evidence of such cures, should I recommend that patients do nothing to get cured? Claims similar to yours are made by many quacks. Without medical diagnoses and comparison to statistics of the general population, they mean nothing.

[Chris Haynes]

Dana Ullman has NOT claimed that homeopathy has a viable treatment or cure for HIV/AIDS. So far neither does conventional medicine claim to have a cure for HIV/AIDS.

All that Dana Ullman has said is that Homeopathic treatment holds promise for such cure / treatment and proper trials need to be carried out so as to establish this. He has at no time stated that patients should abandon conventional treatment and look for homeopathic treatment for HIV/AIDS.

Do you find this objectionable?

Yes, because it includes "wishful thinking".

This is very dangerous ground you and Ullman are walking on. If you even think of promising some kind of effect with your magic water or sugar pills you better have some durn good data.

Where is that data... and is it replicable?

[manioberoi]

We know that "spontaneous remission" actually happens. Diseases are cured without intervention by anybody. If I collect anedotal evidence of such cures, should I recommend that patients do nothing to get cured? Claims similar to yours are made by many quacks. Without medical diagnoses and comparison to statistics of the general population, they mean nothing.
Spontaneous remission in 6 out of 6 cases??

[manioberoi]

Yes, because it includes "wishful thinking".

This is very dangerous ground you and Ullman are walking on. If you even think of promising some kind of effect with your magic water or sugar pills you better have some durn good data.

Where is that data... and is it replicable?
What wishful thinking? What dangerous ground? aka "Conspiracy Theory"
The official position of homeopathy in India is clearly stated - At present homeopaths will only carry out counselling for HIV / AIDS prevention as part of their public health duties.

All HIV / AIDS cases are notifiable by law and are to be dealt with strictly by conventional medicine.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Spontaneous remission in 6 out of 6 cases??

Third hand report of inadequately described clinical cases. There are many reasons why 6 out of 6 cases might be reported through hat same unreliable chain as being "cured".

I'm afraid that by your repeated use of such anecdotes, I'm afraid that yu reveal that deep dow you simply do not understand the need for pairing clinical cases with placebo-treated controls. Like every homeopath I have ever met, you regard proper trials as window dressing for something you think you already know. Your great mistake is in failing to accept that the evidence base on which you rely to "know" what you think you know is utterly flawed and is simply logically incapable of supporting the conclusions you draw from it.

Which is wht I have asked you, several times, the same question, which you have steadfastly failed to answer;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[SYLVESTER1592]

Dual energy X-ray absorptiometry could be used to advantage.
Why would you want to use DEXA when you are looking at cartilage damage?...

[SYLVESTER1592]

Thanks. Agree , also Xray as suggested.
Great,
Now you need to have a definitive diagnosis and set up clear inclusion criteria. This means you would have to work trough the differential diagnosis of arthritis. I recommend you let conventional medicine take care of that. It would mean that you would also have to do the other tests to make sure you are only looking at osteoarthritis... since conventional medicine has an entire sub-specialty that deals with rheumatology I think you would do better to let them handle this part of making the diagnosis (it is safer in the way that you don't run the risk to misdiagnose and postpone treatment, but also in the way that it protects your research from possible unforeseen errors: the object of the research is to evaluate the drug, not the homeopath making the diagnosis) .

[SYLVESTER1592]

Some quotes in this thread to make you think about why you are deciding to do research. It's probably the most important part of the start of your research, so look at it carefully:

Third hand report of inadequately described clinical cases. There are many reasons why 6 out of 6 cases might be reported through hat same unreliable chain as being "cured".

I'm afraid that by your repeated use of such anecdotes, I'm afraid that yu reveal that deep down you simply do not understand the need for pairing clinical cases with placebo-treated controls. Like every homeopath I have ever met, you regard proper trials as window dressing for something you think you already know. Your great mistake is in failing to accept that the evidence base on which you rely to "know" what you think you know is utterly flawed and is simply logically incapable of supporting the conclusions you draw from it.

Which is what I have asked you, several times, the same question, which you have steadfastly failed to answer;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?
I thought you understood what we consider proof....?
As this will only serve to "prove"that homeopathy works in your opinion and a negative result does not mean anything to you, why do you want to do the trial?

You do the trial to make up your own mind and advance the knowledge in your profession...Not for us. We couldn't care less at this point.

If there was some evidence of homeopathy working, we would pay attention, but don't do it for us...

Do you understand what I'm saying?

SYL :)
I thought you understood what we consider proof....?
As this will only serve to "prove"that homeopathy works in your opinion and a negative result does not mean anything to you, why do you want to do the trial?

You do the trial to make up your own mind and advance the knowledge in your profession...Not for us. We couldn't care less at this point.

If there was some evidence of homeopathy working, we would pay attention, but don't do it for us...

Do you understand what I'm saying?

SYL :)

In the Netherlands it is largely frowned upon in palliative care, but a trial as complementary treatment could be conceivable. As an alternative treatment, replacing pain medication, it is hardly ethical, so that in my opinion is a definite No No. I don't know how things works in the US and Canada, but I imagine the sentiment would be the same. Homeopaths in the Netherlands have told some of their patients after they had already left the hospital that paracetamol is enough to kill the pain in combination with the homeopathic treatment. To say this to a slowly dying terminal patient in severe pain... Well, I think you can imagine what I what I would like to do (and I'm not just talking about the patient).


Actually, you just mentioned an illness that will clear up by itself and for which there is no treatment of the cause but only supportive treatment. So test away...
The timeline of the test needs argumentation, as would the reason to treat a patient.
The argument is, you need to show that there is a reason to test a drug on a patient. The reason (most often) could be that laboratory test showed a promising effect of the drug on animals or cell culture. Another reason could be that the drug was designed for another illness but has shown a promising effect that had not been recognized before. Yet another reason could be that many case reports led to a small patient group presenting beneficial effects of an formerly unknown substance. This has happened in the case of homeopathy, but the following trials failed to show a conclusive or even promising result under careful scrutiny by peers in the medical world. This normally means further research is shelved. But you don't start testing on patients first and analyze later. That is something you do in the lab on animals or cell culture. Even if the new drug is only a derivative of a already known drug, testing normally starts in the lab. I understand very well that you believe it is all bunk and they are only getting water anyway, so there would be no problem. But by subjecting patients to a trial, they have to follow the trial protocol. This means the patients are subjected to tests and a regimen that is often an infringement on the normal care given by their physician. For a benign problem (something you would encounter in a General Practitioner's office on a Monday morning) this can probably be done and the burden of the trial can be minimized. For more serious disease it becomes another story and I would have serious problems with the reasons for such a trial.

In general: A drug that does not work in the lab, does not make it to the patient.

( On a side note: I think some of the few exceptions where shortcuts were taken and testing in humans started long before labtests were finished were trials done by Bayer in WWII and more recently trials done on HIV patients in Africa, but I think we can agree this should not be considered normal )

SYL :)

Thank you, that's one

So if all the evidence is questionable, the objective results are lacking in the performed trials, you acknowledge that the chemical difference can not be shown, that the homeopathic solution would only show placebo...
Why pursue the idea that the effect would be different.
If there is an effect on the water even after the diluted chemical substance is gone, why can't you show it?
If the effect is the same as placebo in well-designed trials, if the chemical analysis is the same as placebo, if you can't show the mechanism of action, if you can not produce a reason for it to work... Why can't you draw the conclusion that it is a placebo?

How about those other comments...

SYL :)

You do realize this can be tested for, right? (ETA: just like you can test weither or not prayer helps in recovery. Or shaking stuffed koalas over sick people. No "molecules" to be analyzed, but the effects of those practices can easily be analyzed, just like the effects of any attempted treatment can be analyzed, regardless of the intricacies of the treatment itself.)

If homeopathic remedies work, then they have an effect on patients. If homeopathic remedies work differently depending on weither or not they have been exposed to, say, sunlight, then they will have different effects on patients.

Two groups. One treated with non-sunlightified remedies. One treated with sunlightified remedies. Compare the results.

That's one of the major points of clinical trials: replace anecdotes with data.

In fact, I'm starting to believe you have absolutely no idea what clinical trials are about and how they differentiate from a guy on the street telling you what happened to his sister-in-law last year.

It is very interesting to see that you use the word may here? How would you find out if such exposures did or didn't have an effect? (Clue: you could try with and without such exposures and look for a difference ... maybe you could even put in steps to avoid any bias by blinding the process ...) :rolleyes:

Have you any proof for these possible claims or are you just adding to your list of obstacles in the hope we will get bored? Why do you have to keep coming up with excuses/obstacles? Why don't you care about finding out if homoeopathy does, or doesn't, work?:boggled:

Given all the ways you have listed that homeopathy can fail... what makes you think homeopathy works at all? :confused:

I'm wondering why Dana keeps saying "take off the blinders" (I assume he means blinkers) when he has shown nothing that has impressed anyone, and yet at the same time he himself is constantly ignoring all the very serious objections to his viewpoint which are being constantly put in front of him.

I-am-not-a-psychologist, but it seems to me he's not a very clear thinker, but is very much invested in the world-view that homoeoapthy works. Therefore when something odd appears which looks as if it might support that world-view, he latches on to it enthusiastically and uncritically - hey look, this is wonderful, it must be true!!!

But at the same time he is stunningly unwilling to take off his own blinkers and address the points we feel to be fatal flaws in his thesis. He just keeps repeating, but look at this great paper - while ignoring both the reasoned criticisms which have been made of these papers, and the other points which keep being put to him.

Very poor intellect, I'm afraid, if we're getting personal.

Rolfe.

:idea: As you can see several of us have raised the question why you would want to do a study. As long as homeopathy does not recognize that science progresses and that a new paper can completely destroy what you tried to prove, there will be no progression. The latching on to papers once published 100 years ago, that have long been refuted is an example of that. So is the persistent referral to anecdotal "evidence".

:idea: Can you subscribe to BSM and Rolfe's comments and decide to take notice of the results, including when they turn out negative? I mean you are asking us to look at evidence when it turns out positive, this would also mean that you would have to look at it when it turns out negative...

I think a negative result would have to be weighed against the positive ones. The fact that a paper is refuted actually shows it does not work and means your evidence ends up in the bin.

:idea: It would also mean that the collected works and corresponding conclusions about the anecdotal evidence gathered in the last 150 years is useless and belongs in the bin. You would start over in a scientific manner and work through a way to build a discipline that could improve itself. Conventional medicine has taken that step long ago. Can you subscribe to these things?

Please read it carefully and think it over. It is an important premise to start of on your research. You do the best research you can, compare it with others and accept the outcome to improve your discipline. If you can not do that, then there is no point in doing research, because you don't use it anyway...

SYL :)

[krazyKemist]

There is no conspiracy. Its all about money.

Homeopaths would lose but the public would lose much much more.

1 in 100 people using homeopathy always go to a homeopath for the remedy. The rest only consult a homeopath for an intractable problem and use the remedy kits for routine problems.

mmm... I'm not sure the public would lose that much... After all, what I believe is that homeopathic manufacturers sell high-priced placebos. Telling people what it is might actually save some lives.

But don't you think that's a little like... cheating ? What I mean is that, well, pharmas have to spend money to prove efficiency, homeopaths do not. Homeopathic remedy manufacturers just sell water at a very high profit rate.

Pharmas stand to lose as much, if not more, when a drug causes harm (see the Vioxx case). The pharmaceutical industry is a high risk venture and its money is quite volatile, since it usually comes from the stock market. One scandal not only costs you from people who are suiing you, but also from a loss of investors. They are no angels (I've seen enough to know that !), but their behavior only reflects the mentality of the stock market.

the Kemist

[krazyKemist]

Spontaneous remission in 6 out of 6 cases??

Not quite... I think that you misunderstand. Those are actually 6 remission cases out of an unknown number of patients. You can't remove cases out of statistics simply because they do not work to your satisfaction. It does not work that way. It is the main reason anecdotes are not data. You have to follow-up every one of them.

Now if you really want to do actual testing, some people here have suggested very good protocols. What I would add is to get your hands on a Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) guide from FDA or equivalent from another drug testing agency and follow it to the letter. That way, when comes time to submit your paper, you will be able to defend its quality to good journals.

Another thing is to follow the process of peer review in the right order, meaning, publish first in a specialized journal that is known for its rigor, rather than a wide spectrum or public-oriented one where review might be too whooly or done by non-specialists.

the Kemist

[krazyKemist]

Like these?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=retrieve&db=pubmed&list_uids=2655683&dopt=Abstract
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B8CWK-4MDGN8F-3&_user=10&_coverDate=04%2F30%2F1998&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=595be723c5173e8b1cbaa97deb3ea544
http://www.cochrane.org/reviews/en/ab001957.html

Linda

Thanks :)

Hey, those actually work! I'll get the full papers when I get the chance.

the Kemist

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Spontaneous remission in 6 out of 6 cases??

Uncontrolled for anything. Insufficient sample size.

[Chris Haynes]

What wishful thinking? What dangerous ground? aka "Conspiracy Theory"
The official position of homeopathy in India is clearly stated - At present homeopaths will only carry out counselling for HIV / AIDS prevention as part of their public health duties.

All HIV / AIDS cases are notifiable by law and are to be dealt with strictly by conventional medicine.

Well, that is very good news. I'm glad to see someone in India has some kind of sense. Even here Ullman would get into very bad trouble if he tried to actually treat HIV positive person with just homeopathy. There is a reason it is technically only allowed for self-limiting diseases.

Of course, neither of you have shown homeopathy does anything for either syphilis or HIV.

[manioberoi]

Third hand report of inadequately described clinical cases. There are many reasons why 6 out of 6 cases might be reported through hat same unreliable chain as being "cured".

I'm afraid that by your repeated use of such anecdotes, I'm afraid that yu reveal that deep dow you simply do not understand the need for pairing clinical cases with placebo-treated controls. Like every homeopath I have ever met, you regard proper trials as window dressing for something you think you already know. Your great mistake is in failing to accept that the evidence base on which you rely to "know" what you think you know is utterly flawed and is simply logically incapable of supporting the conclusions you draw from it.

Which is wht I have asked you, several times, the same question, which you have steadfastly failed to answer;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?
Out of context - not presenting standard proof here - only answering your query as to how I personally can be so sure. Do not think that I want you to either believe or accept this as proof that homeopathy works - Not at all - we are working towards a proper modality for proof separately.

[manioberoi]

Why would you want to use DEXA when you are looking at cartilage damage?...
For RA an important early indicator is BMD and see:

"Rheumatology International 2006, vol. 26, no12, pp. 1084-1090
Multi- site quantitative ultrasound compared to dual energy X-ray absorptiometry in rheumatoid arthritis : effects of body mass index and inflamed soft tissue on reproducibility
PFEIL A. (1) ; BÖTTCHER J. (1) ; MENTZEL H. J. (1) ; LEHMANN G. (2) ; SCHÄFER M. L. (1) ; KRAMER A. (1) ; PETROVITCH A. (1) ; SEIDL B. E. (1) ; MALICH A. (3) ; HEIN G. (2) ; WOLF G. (2) ; KAISER W. A. (1) ;
(1) Institute of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Erlanger Allee 101, Jena 07747, ALLEMAGNE
(2) Department of Rheumatology and Osteology, Clinic of Internal Medicine III, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, Erlanger Allee 101, Jena 07747, ALLEMAGNE
(3) Department of Radiology, Sued-Harz Klinikum, Nordhausen, ALLEMAGNE

Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases 2002;61:325-329
Bone quality and bone mass as assessed by quantitative ultrasound and dual energy x ray absorptiometry in women with rheumatoid arthritis: relationship with quadriceps strength
O R Madsen1,2, O H Sørensen1 and C Egsmose3
1 Osteoporosis Research Clinic, Hvidovre University Hospital, Denmark
2 Department of Rheumatology, Amager and Herlev University Hospitals, Denmark
3 Department of Rheumatology, Bispebjerg and Gentofte University Hospitals, Denmark

Rheumatology Volume 35, Number 12 Pp. 1256-1262
CLINICAL ASSOCIATIONS OF DUAL-ENERGY X-RAY ABSORPTIOMETRY MEASUREMENT OF HAND BONE MASS IN RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS
J. DEVLIN, J. LILLEY, A. GOUGH, A. HUISSOON, R. HOLDER, R. REECE, P. PERKINS and P. EMERY
Department of Rheumatology, University of Birmingham
*School of Mathematics and Statistics, University of Birmingham
Department of Nuclear Medicine, Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham"

[manioberoi]

Great,
Now you need to have a definitive diagnosis and set up clear inclusion criteria. This means you would have to work trough the differential diagnosis of arthritis. I recommend you let conventional medicine take care of that. It would mean that you would also have to do the other tests to make sure you are only looking at osteoarthritis... since conventional medicine has an entire sub-specialty that deals with rheumatology I think you would do better to let them handle this part of making the diagnosis (it is safer in the way that you don't run the risk to misdiagnose and postpone treatment, but also in the way that it protects your research from possible unforeseen errors: the object of the research is to evaluate the drug, not the homeopath making the diagnosis) .
Agree that the suggestion makes sense to me.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Out of context - not presenting standard proof here - only answering your query as to how I personally can be so sure. Do not think that I want you to either believe or accept this as proof that homeopathy works - Not at all - we are working towards a proper modality for proof separately.

Sorry, manioberoi, your English has wandered a long way from comprehensible there.

I think you have, yet again, failed to answer the question I posed. This time I'll pose it without reference to the other issues. Please quote this post in your reply and just answer this single question. It is futile going any further with you unless you answer this question;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[Pipirr]

Out of context - not presenting standard proof here - only answering your query as to how I personally can be so sure. Do not think that I want you to either believe or accept this as proof that homeopathy works - Not at all - we are working towards a proper modality for proof separately.


I see your point here; I did after all ask you how you could be so certain. Personal experience can contribute significantly to one's confidence in something. The six case studies that you listed, apparently contributed to your own confidence in homeopathy. That they do not provide scientific evidence or validity for homeopathy, well, that's an additional topic for discussion.

[manioberoi]

Some quotes in this thread to make you think about why you are deciding to do research. It's probably the most important part of the start of your research, so look at it carefully:

















:idea: As you can see several of us have raised the question why you would want to do a study. As long as homeopathy does not recognize that science progresses and that a new paper can completely destroy what you tried to prove, there will be no progression. The latching on to papers once published 100 years ago, that have long been refuted is an example of that. So is the persistent referral to anecdotal "evidence".

:idea: Can you subscribe to BSM and Rolfe's comments and decide to take notice of the results, including when they turn out negative? I mean you are asking us to look at evidence when it turns out positive, this would also mean that you would have to look at it when it turns out negative...

I think a negative result would have to be weighed against the positive ones. The fact that a paper is refuted actually shows it does not work and means your evidence ends up in the bin.

:idea: It would also mean that the collected works and corresponding conclusions about the anecdotal evidence gathered in the last 150 years is useless and belongs in the bin. You would start over in a scientific manner and work through a way to build a discipline that could improve itself. Conventional medicine has taken that step long ago. Can you subscribe to these things?

Please read it carefully and think it over. It is an important premise to start of on your research. You do the best research you can, compare it with others and accept the outcome to improve your discipline. If you can not do that, then there is no point in doing research, because you don't use it anyway...

SYL :)
Some of these points need serious consideration in the best interests of the future course of homeopathy.

[manioberoi]

Not quite... I think that you misunderstand. Those are actually 6 remission cases out of an unknown number of patients. You can't remove cases out of statistics simply because they do not work to your satisfaction. It does not work that way. It is the main reason anecdotes are not data. You have to follow-up every one of them.

Now if you really want to do actual testing, some people here have suggested very good protocols. What I would add is to get your hands on a Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) guide from FDA or equivalent from another drug testing agency and follow it to the letter. That way, when comes time to submit your paper, you will be able to defend its quality to good journals.

Another thing is to follow the process of peer review in the right order, meaning, publish first in a specialized journal that is known for its rigor, rather than a wide spectrum or public-oriented one where review might be too whooly or done by non-specialists.

the Kemist
The ICMR Research Guidelines are based on international practice. The CCRH is co-operating with the ICMR to adopt ICMR Research Guidelines.

I would not like homeopathic remedies to be tested by purely conventional oriented practice. Certain modifications in the protocols as is emerging out of this discussion would help to include the peculiarities of homeopathic action as well as meet the stricter standards desirable in todays more scientific and critical environment.

Certainly your suggestions are very positive and should be incorporated in any sound and acceptable homeopathic trial.

[manioberoi]

Not quite... I think that you misunderstand. Those are actually 6 remission cases out of an unknown number of patients. You can't remove cases out of statistics simply because they do not work to your satisfaction. It does not work that way. It is the main reason anecdotes are not data. You have to follow-up every one of them.

Now if you really want to do actual testing, some people here have suggested very good protocols. What I would add is to get your hands on a Good Laboratory Practices (GLP) guide from FDA or equivalent from another drug testing agency and follow it to the letter. That way, when comes time to submit your paper, you will be able to defend its quality to good journals.

Another thing is to follow the process of peer review in the right order, meaning, publish first in a specialized journal that is known for its rigor, rather than a wide spectrum or public-oriented one where review might be too whooly or done by non-specialists.

the Kemist
And how might a homeopath publish at the inital stage in any other than the homeopathic or alternative journals which do not pass muster of members of this forum?

[manioberoi]

Thanks :)

Hey, those actually work! I'll get the full papers when I get the chance.

the Kemist
But self limiting illness??

[manioberoi]

Uncontrolled for anything. Insufficient sample size.
Would 9 out of 9 cases coming in sequence - not selected cases - and cured be insufficient even to warrant a serious trial?

[Gord_in_Toronto]

Would 9 out of 9 cases coming in sequence - not selected cases - and cured be insufficient even to warrant a serious trial?

"not selected cases"? Wooosh! :jaw-dropp

"Lies, damn lies and statistics".

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

I see we have more replies, but no answers from manioberoi to this question;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[Mojo]

And how might a homeopath publish at the inital stage in any other than the homeopathic or alternative journals which do not pass muster of members of this forum?


By producing work that is of good enough quality to get into reputable journals. Are you invoking some sort of conspiracy again?

[kieran]

You have not considered the fact that in conventional medicine, the drug companies research the new drug and independent doctors at research facilities carry out the trials (in the ideal world the drug companies carry no influence on the trial even if they pay for them) with proper double blind controls & c.

Who pays for the trials - the drug companies - who then recover the cost (and more) from the sale of the drug.

I think you were foolish to try to defend your little "big pharma conspiracy" at all, but the approach you took implies you didn't actually think about what I said ...

No-one of the trials we have talked about require a great deal of money. But proper trials do require thought and integrity - which is why I think they don't ever get carried out by homoeopaths. (I do hope that get quoted ... :) )

Again ... what is stopping homoeopathic practioners doing these kind of trials for themselves? They can start out by coming up with small scale tests that can be conducted in their day to day work - just to get used to the idea. They can discuss the structure of their tests and results with others to see if they can improve upon their tests. Keep it among themselves until they are happy to face the world with their "proof"(*) The cost of this is virtually negligible. You only have to pay the big bucks if you want to sell this stuff as conventional medicine when you have to prove that you have proven its safety and efficacy to the best of your ability. If a homoeopath can show that it works under reasonable controls then, what is stopping them publishing it in their own journals - as opposed to just rolling out a pile of anecdotes? Why has no-one even vaguely attempted this in the homoeopathic literature? Come on ... don't pretend to be dim ... you know the answer ....

(*) Of course - homoeopaths may have already gone down this route, and not liked the results, and so they have to invent reasons why homoeopathy is a special case and shouldn't be tested in this way. Who'd know eh?? ;)

I think you have added this economic element as another excuse. But it is just a smokescreen and is really just pointless crap.


As for homeopathic remedies the proving is done by any homeopath or homeopathic organisation.

Manufacture of homeopathic remedies is a relatively routine process requiring no excessive costs of safety trials & c. Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy.

Let's just re-read that last sentence and pause for thought shall we? .... "Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy." :eye-poppi

Do you mean that homoeopaths - without any proof that they made any difference at all - are happy to plod on in ignorance? :covereyes

Even if he were to feel like carrying out a trial, such as has been suggested here the costs(in the region of 5 to 10 million dollars) would dissuade the richest homeopath from attempting this.

No homeopathic remedy manufacturer would agree to bear the cost since all single homeopathic remedies are FREE to manufacture and there are over 1000 manufacturers of homeopathic remedies worldwide.

So if this forum were to be serious about a long series of homeopathic trials, a little thought needs to be given on how to share out the costs among all the homeopaths and all the homeopathic remedy manufacturers worldwide - and set up an organisation to carry out such a series of trials.

Right - we've dis-spelled your invented economic obstacle above - what is stopping you?

Don't you ever feel like you are running out of places to hide while trying to defend homoeopathy? :boxedin:

[kieran]

And how might a homeopath publish at the inital stage in any other than the homeopathic or alternative journals which do not pass muster of members of this forum?

As Mojo said, if the work is of sufficient quality, then it will get into a reputable journal.

But before you return to your "conspiracy theory" style of defence on that ... I'd like to add - even the poorly-formed first attempts at this kind of study should be available in the homoeopathic literature ... but instead the papers you quote from such journals are filled with anecdotes, uncontrolled studies, and excuses for why blinded trials don't "work" for homoeopathy. This stuff has been around for hundreds of years yet the best you've got is anecdotes :confused: Why does no-one inside homoeopathy care if it really works or not? :rolleyes:

As I pointed out to you before ... (remember the big red writing!) ... the references you have given from the homoeopathic literature have been dismissed here because of the poor quality of the work, not just because of the location they were published.

By publishing crap in these journals, homoeopaths under-mine the integrity of all the work presented - but a strong piece of work, even from such a dubious source, will stand up to criticism and will be considered evidence.

Frankly, I find it pathetic that you try to blame every one else apart from homoeopaths themselves for the p!ss poor state of the homoeopathic literature. :rolleyes:

Doesn't this embarass you? Do you understand why we are so skeptical of the claims made by homoeopathy? Don't you think that you should start a skeptical campaign from the inside to remove the hear-say and smoke-screens, and look for real evidence of this thing you are so convinced by? What are you afraid of? :confused:

[MRC_Hans]

I have not read the posts after this one yet, but:

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.

This is not correct. The vast majority of patients experience little or no side effects. Most side effects that exist are beneign and of transient nature. Conventional medicines are under strict regulation, and are not released if they cannot be shown to have an acceptable "cost-benefit" ratio. That is, the side effects must be less harmful than the disease the medicine is addressing.

You statement above is a pure anti medicine propaganda lie.


In homeopathy, provided a lower 'balancing' potency in the range of 6X to 6C (water) is used the effects are slow in coming up (for the first month) but the cure thereafter is increasingly perceptible and entirely without the kind of side effects stated above.


That is not correct. Your claim that the cure is perceptible is unfounded. You do not have evidence for it.

(But I agree that there are no side effects. Water is largely considered harmless).

So even if the homeopath throws the dice successfully the seventh time (most good homeopaths manage it on the first or second throw) the patient will still be benefited more by homeopathy than by conventional medicne in a chronic disease.

However, you cannot show any evidence that the homeopath throws the dice successfully ever.

[MRC_Hans]

The remedy at 12C is diluted to 100 to the power 12 ie 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 (is also equal to 24X which is 10 to the power 24). This scale of dilution (Avogadro's Number) is such that the probability of even a single molecule of the original substance being present in the remedy is for all practical purposes ZERO.

Ehr, yes, we know that. Thank you for confirming one of our main points.


So the only trials that can be done are trials to verify the effectiveness of remedies against placebo(?). You cannot ask to chemically test the remedy as it would only show placebo(?)


Yes, we know that.

Incidentally even Sac lac (the homeopathic equivalent of placebo has been known to cure - and I personally know a lady who gets the most terrible aggravation from Sac lac.

So you admit that the things you claim to observe for homeopathic remedies can be a placebo reaction? Why, thanks!

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

You have not considered the fact that in conventional medicine, the drug companies research the new drug and independent doctors at research facilities carry out the trials (in the ideal world the drug companies carry no influence on the trial even if they pay for them) with proper double blind controls & c.

Who pays for the trials - the drug companies - who then recover the cost (and more) from the sale of the drug.

All this is correct.


As for homeopathic remedies the proving is done by any homeopath or homeopathic organisation.

Manufacture of homeopathic remedies is a relatively routine process requiring no excessive costs of safety trials & c. Once the proving is done no homeopath feels the necessity to carry out trials of effectiveness of the remedy. Even if he were to feel like carrying out a trial, such as has been suggested here the costs(in the region of 5 to 10 million dollars) would dissuade the richest homeopath from attempting this.

No homeopathic remedy manufacturer would agree to bear the cost since all single homeopathic remedies are FREE to manufacture and there are over 1000 manufacturers of homeopathic remedies worldwide.


Financing is a point. The motivation for the homeoapthic manufacturer, under the present system, is that if one proved the efficacy of their remedies, and aquired medical registration, they would have the possibility to increase the whole market greatly, and at the same time make life extremely difficult for their competitors. How easy do you think it would be to sell a non-registered remedy, if a registered was on the market? In many countries, regulations would make it downright impossible.

So if this forum were to be serious about a long series of homeopathic trials, a little thought needs to be given on how to share out the costs among all the homeopaths and all the homeopathic remedy manufacturers worldwide - and set up an organisation to carry out such a series of trials.

My personal idea is that we should influence authorities to outlaw homeopathic remedies till they ar properly tested and registered. If homeoapthy claims to be real medicine, then it should be treated as such.

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

Dana Ullman has NOT claimed that homeopathy has a viable treatment or cure for HIV/AIDS. So far neither does conventional medicine claim to have a cure for HIV/AIDS.

All that Dana Ullman has said is that Homeopathic treatment holds promise for such cure / treatment and proper trials need to be carried out so as to establish this. He has at no time stated that patients should abandon conventional treatment and look for homeopathic treatment for HIV/AIDS.

Do you find this objectionable?

Yes. His claim that homeopathic treatment even holds promise is unfounded. As long as the claim is not backed by tangible evidence, not only should patients not abandon conventional treatment, but homeopathic treatment should not even be suggested to them.

Hans

[kieran]

alcoholus is a homeopathic remedy so is sac lac. Pure water is not - so far.
What exactly were you trying to say about pure water here? Were you opening up the door to being able to claim that pure water is a homoeopathic remedy in the future? :boggled:

While I think most here will agree that there is no difference between the effect of a homoeopathic "remedy" and pure water, I don't think you will find that favourable to homoeopathy. ;)

[Rolfe]

I am beginning to understand your objections and I sort of get the feeling that you are genuinely concerned that homeopathic remedies do nothing....

Wow! Light dawns!

Yes, manioberoi, that is exactly the case. I'm just stunned that you seem to have taken so long to realise this! Why do you think we are having this conversation in the first place?

We know there is no physical presence of the homoeopathic remedy in most of the preparations used, and we are unimpressed by all the flaky and unrepeatable studies that have been carried out to try to show that nevertheless there might be some physical difference in the carrier material. We realise, as apparently you do not, the sheer depth of the assault any such proven effect would make on the accepted scientific world-view, and thus, how extraordinarily unlikely it is to be true. Indeed, we understand as you seem not to understand, how vanishingly unlikely it is that ordinary biological tests and even the ordinary world such as engines and computers and so on would work as they obviously do work, if any of that "water memory" theory was actually true.

We are impressed by none of your anecdotes, because we are aware how fickle individual cases can be and how often patients recover without any treatment. We are also aware of how it is possible to persuade a patient, by kindly attention, that they are feeling a little better perhaps, even when in fact their condition has not changed. We, who are familiar with how sick people and animals progress and deteriorate on a daily basis, see nothing at all in the entire body of homoeopathic literature, that can't be easily explained by simple coincidence (homoeopath taking credit for what would have happened anyway), or the suggestibility of both patient and homoeopath.

That you do not have the clarity of mind to examine your beliefs and take account of this aspect is really quite sad.

You cling to your image of yourself as someone who helps patients. We see someone who is either competely deluded into believing that these inert remedies are influencing the course of the patient's condition, or a bare-faced fraud, taking money from desperate people for "treatment" you know to be valueless. (In your case I'm prepared to concede the former may be the actual situation.) We are therefore concerned and indeed outraged for the patients who are being misled and/or tricked in this manner.

Unless you can take a step back and recognise how we regard you, and take on board the reasons why we are of that opinion, then the conversation won't get very far.

Rolfe.

[Rolfe]

The conventional medicines are tagged with severe side effects and each causes some new disease, cancer, genetic damage, liver dysfunction, blood disorders, immue suppression and the like. EVERY prescription has a high cost of cure - one that the patient bears for the rest of her life.
I have to step in with Hans on this one. This is complete nonsense.

Manioberoi, you seem to be knowledgeable in some aspects of science, but your knowledge is patchy and partial. In this aspect you are so wide of the mark you are on a different planet. You seem either to be parroting slander you have heard elsewhere, or to be one of these people who reads lists of reported side-effects and somehow comes away with the belief that all of these side-effects will inevitably happen to everyone who takes the drug.

This is not the case. Lists of side-effects are list of things that some people have reported as experiencing after taking the drug. (And, like a homoeopathic proving, it's possible some of these things might simply have been coincidental.) Most people experience no side-effects from any routine drugs. Almost nobody experiences all the side-effects on the list for any drug.

There are some "desperate remedies" for desperate diseases which come with inevitable side-effects, but even there, these side effects are usually temporary (such as the loss of hair related to many cancer treatments). And the bottom line is, there has to be a net benefit at the end. No doctor is going to use a drug which will leave their patient worse off than before. (Yes, sometimes a patient is left worse off, but these are isolated cases of idiosyncratic reactions, and if they were any more than isolated, the drug would have to be withdrawn.)

And to repeat, most people experience no side effects from most common medications.

Rolfe.

[MRC_Hans]

Wow! Light dawns!

*snip*

Unless you can take a step back and recognise how we regard you, and take on board the reasons why we are of that opinion, then the conversation won't get very far.

Rolfe.Very precisely put!

And if manioberoi had indeed taken this step, he would not continue posting more anecdotes, and he would not keep making unfounded claims. ..And he would be on his way to the stark realization that he might actually be mistaken.

I have a question for you manioberoi. One that you don't have to answer here, just answer it to yourself:

Suppose a protocol was designed for testing homeopathy. One that satisfied both the skeptics and the homeopaths.

Suppose that protocol was carried out in an actual test. Results were collected, the participating homeopaths were asked to report on how they regarded the test; did the protocol interfere unduly with their mode of work, did they experience any difficulties that might influence the results, etc. They all reported back that no difficulties were experienced. (This is the way a real clinical trial is handled)

Now, suppose, we reveal the codes and compare the groups and find: Nothing. No difference except the expectable noise exists between the homeopathy result and the placebo result.

What would you conclude?

Would you conclude that:

1) It seems homeopathy does actually not work (at least in the context tested).

2) It seems the trial was flawed after all.

Hans

Hans

[MRC_Hans]

*snip*
This is not the case. Lists of side-effects are list of things that some people have reported as experiencing after taking the drug. (And, like a homoeopathic proving, it's possible some of these things might simply have been coincidental.) *snip*
Rolfe.Actually, this is an interesting comparison. You see, there is a profound difference between pharma companies are required to state efficacy and how they must list side effects.

To list efficacy, they must conduct clinical trials, and the results must be statistical significant.

However, if a side effect is reported, and there is even suspicion that it might have been caused by the drug, they are required to list it.

In other words, they are required to prove that the drug works, and they have to disprove that it causes a given side effect. Read the inlay of a drug, and you will find that some of the reported side effects are listed as rare. This means that they are observed for less than one patient in a thousand.

Now remember that homeopaths base their assumption of efficacy on a system that is similar to the side effect reporting (except that there is no reporting system in place): If it hasn't been disproven that the cure was due to homeopathy, then it is assumed to be a homeopathic cure.

Hans

[krazyKemist]

And how might a homeopath publish at the inital stage in any other than the homeopathic or alternative journals which do not pass muster of members of this forum?

By having a spectacularly well-made study, following a well-established drug testing protocol.

Except for conferences, you cannot publish the same material twice. That is considered scientific fraud (get two publications for the price of one kind of thing) That is why the journal must be chosen carefully to establish credibility. If the journal has been known in the past to let whooly studies pass its editorial board (as many alt med journals do, unfortunately:( ), then there is much more reason to doubt your results.

Getting passed by a rigorous editorial board is much harder work, and expect your results to be thoroughly investigated, given the nature of what you claim. But you won't get rejected on grounds of 'this is homeopathy'. Good journals are not controlled by the 'drug industry'. The collaboration which would be needed for this is almost impossible. Drug companies cooperate in very few things. In fact they are very competitive towards one another (you should see how much effort they put in keeping secrets from one another :) ). What hurts one company is often quite good for its competitor... Again, see what happened with vioxx.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

By having a spectacularly well-made study, following a well-established drug testing protocol.

Except for conferences, you cannot publish the same material twice. That is considered scientific fraud (get two publications for the price of one kind of thing) That is why the journal must be chosen carefully to establish credibility. If the journal has been known in the past to let whooly studies pass its editorial board (as many alt med journals do, unfortunately:( ), then there is much more reason to doubt your results.

Getting passed by a rigorous editorial board is much harder work, and expect your results to be thoroughly investigated, given the nature of what you claim. But you won't get rejected on grounds of 'this is homeopathy'. Good journals are not controlled by the 'drug industry'. The collaboration which would be needed for this is almost impossible. Drug companies cooperate in very few things. In fact they are very competitive towards one another (you should see how much effort they put in keeping secrets from one another :) ). What hurts one company is often quite good for its competitor... Again, see what happened with vioxx.

the Kemist
I have been busy analyzing the 600 plus posts in this thread. Hence the delay in posting.

Some fundamental questions and some major observations:

1. Are you saying that all categories of disease would get better in 5% of cases (Post #1 & c) without treatment of any kind?

2. Are you then saying that cases of cancers (Staged, Graded, Typed) that have shown very low long term (18 to 24 months) cure rates of below 2% with chemotherapy would achieve 5% cure rate in the absence of all treatment?

3. A proper considered answer to #1 has not been given.

4. No answer at all has been given to the post (Asian Pacific J Cancer Prev) #664.

5. If some besotted homeopath does take up Randi's offer and succeeds should it not rightly be written off in the 5% clause and Randi should resile from his offer on the justified ground that the exception proves the rule (that homeopathy does not work).

6. So come on state upfront whether a one off like Randi's (unscientific?) offer is acceptable to the highly scientific members of this forum? Because it would most certainly not pass muster at ANY scientific level - homeopathic or conventional.

7. If it is not then really you are giving homeopathy a Hobbson's Choice of success, because you are starting with the unscientific premise that homeopathy does not work and even if it shows 100% cure in 5 successive trials you will reject them under yopur scientific 5% clause - the 5% clause has no real scientific basis - it is only a priori. It could just as well be .5% or .05 % depending on the level of significance.

8. I suggest that if you want to be scientific - consider the homeopaths circumstance:

A. Any one SINGLE remedy can produce one or more different symptoms from the expected set of symptoms of the provings but symptoms can not be restricted to the provings data alone.

B. No one SINGLE remedy can treat / cure any particular disease of the patient with 100% success rate.

C. No specified disease can be treated by one specific SINGLE remedy alone with 100% success rate.

D. A well chosen SINGLE remedy (alternatively, a set of SINGLE remedies if properly chosen by homeopath) is required to treat / cure the patient and this is amenable to proof in a homeopathically valid well structured double blind trial. Such trials do not seem to have been carried out as on date according to the published literature - at least not in India.

E. The effects of a COMBINATION (mixed set of remedies of one or more potencies) ( non classical homeopathy) can NEVER be predicted - although many claims are being made of their efficacy in advertisements - and in some countries they are being legally permitted to PATENT the COMBINATION raising the costs and profits level astronomically without any acceptable level -acceptable in this forum - of proof of cure).

F. ONLY trials that permit of adherence to the above principles should be carried out (controlled double blind - water vs water potency - 6C (below Avogrado's) in the first set of trials, 30C (beyond Avogadro's) in the second set of trials and any or all potency 3X and above permitted ( all non toxic potencies) in the third set of trials - this potency clause is on account of intractable difference of opinion among homeopaths about how and what works in homeopathy).

9. I rest my case.

Thank you for the very valuable discussion.

Regards.

Sarvadaman Oberoi
H 485 FF Ansals Palam Vihar
Gurgaon 122017 Haryana INDIA
Mobile: +919818768349 Tele: +911244076374
Website: http://www.freewebs.com/homeopathy249/index.htm
email: manioberoi@gmail.com

[manioberoi]

In para 4
for #664
read #647

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

"1. Are you saying that all categories of disease would get better in 5% of cases (Post #1 & c) without treatment of any kind?"

No

"2. Are you then saying that cases of cancers (Staged, Graded, Typed) that have shown very low long term (18 to 24 months) cure rates of below 2% with chemotherapy would achieve 5% cure rate in the absence of all treatment?"

Seems unlikely

"3. A proper considered answer to #1 has not been given."

It's not been asked before and is not relevant to the discussion.

"4. No answer at all has been given to the post (Asian Pacific J Cancer Prev) #664."

That is correct. You posted a citation to a reference but did not draw any inference from it. There is nothing to respond to.

"5. If some besotted homeopath does take up Randi's offer and succeeds should it not rightly be written off in the 5% clause and Randi should resile from his offer on the justified ground that the exception proves the rule (that homeopathy does not work)."

There is no such thing as a "5% clause". You must have invented this. It is well established that if someone succeeds with a well-designed test of paranormal powers that has prior agreement of its validity from both parties then the money is available to a successful claimant.

"6. So come on state upfront whether a one off like Randi's (unscientific?) offer is acceptable to the highly scientific members of this forum? Because it would most certainly not pass muster at ANY scientific level - homeopathic or conventional."

That is your opinion. Your opinion is wrong.

"7. If it is not then really you are giving homeopathy a Hobbson's Choice of success, because you are starting with the unscientific premise that homeopathy does not work and even if it shows 100% cure in 5 successive trials you will reject them under yopur scientific 5% clause - the 5% clause has no real scientific basis - it is only a priori. It could just as well be .5% or .05 % depending on the level of significance."

You continue to misunderstand how probability considerations are applied to scientific trial data.

"8. I suggest that if you want to be scientific - consider the homeopaths circumstance:

A. ...

B. ...

C. ...

D. ...

E. ...

F. ..."

This has all been considered. They are factors in trial design. Homeopaths claim to be able to "cure" patients. The purpose of a trial is to see whether that is likely to be true, all the complexity is their problem. Getting an answer from a trial is not complex. When cheating and bias are well-excluded, homeopaths fail to "cure" patients

"9. I rest my case."

You have not made a case.

Also, after your long deliberations, you have failed yet again to answer this question;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[MRC_Hans]

I have been busy analyzing the 600 plus posts in this thread. Hence the delay in posting.

Nice work, few people bother to do that.


1. Are you saying that all categories of disease would get better in 5% of cases (Post #1 & c) without treatment of any kind?


I don't think anybody in their right mind would make such a claim. Natural remission obviously varies greatly from disease to disease. Common cold has a natural remission rate of 100%, AIDS is so far at zero.

2. Are you then saying that cases of cancers (Staged, Graded, Typed) that have shown very low long term (18 to 24 months) cure rates of below 2% with chemotherapy would achieve 5% cure rate in the absence of all treatment?

No, that would be an absurd claim.

3. A proper considered answer to #1 has not been given.

Have you asked it before?

4. No answer at all has been given to the post (Asian Pacific J Cancer Prev) #664.

What do you expect? There is not enough information to analyze the report.


5. If some besotted homeopath does take up Randi's offer and succeeds should it not rightly be written off in the 5% clause and Randi should resile from his offer on the justified ground that the exception proves the rule (that homeopathy does not work).


With the reservation that I don't know if homeopathy is still applicable after the rule change, the challenge works so that an agreement is made betwee nthe applicant and the JREF on exactly what constitutes a positive result. If the applicant produced what has been agreed as a positive result, he/she wins the prize, period. Whether this can later be showed to be a statistical fluke, have a natural explanation, or something else, is irrelevant. The only thing that could reverse the result is if the applicant could be shown to have actually cheated.


6. So come on state upfront whether a one off like Randi's (unscientific?) offer is acceptable to the highly scientific members of this forum? Because it would most certainly not pass muster at ANY scientific level - homeopathic or conventional.


That is because the JREF challenge, while using scientific methods, is not in itself scientific research. To have something accepted as science, winning the JREF prize would not suffice in itself. It would, however, ensure you much valuable attention from the scientific community and the media, plus, of course, a million dollars you could use for further research.

7. If it is not then really you are giving homeopathy a Hobbson's Choice of success, because you are starting with the unscientific premise that homeopathy does not work and even if it shows 100% cure in 5 successive trials you will reject them under yopur scientific 5% clause - the 5% clause has no real scientific basis - it is only a priori. It could just as well be .5% or .05 % depending on the level of significance.

There is no "5% clause", but I now understand where you get this figure. The statistical significance test (95% confidence level) leaves a 5% possibility of a fluke result. Thus, when a claim is extraordinary, The scientific community will probably defer conclusion till it has been repeated. As I explained earlier, this is because such a result must be weighed against the existing mass of knowledge.


8. I suggest that if you want to be scientific - consider the homeopaths circumstance:

A. Any one SINGLE remedy can produce one or more different symptoms from the expected set of symptoms of the provings but symptoms can not be restricted to the provings data alone.


This is an unproven claim. It has not been proven that a remedy can produce any symptoms at all (in high potencies).


B. No one SINGLE remedy can treat / cure any particular disease of the patient with 100% success rate.


And?


C. No specified disease can be treated by one specific SINGLE remedy alone with 100% success rate.


And?

D. A well chosen SINGLE remedy (alternatively, a set of SINGLE remedies if properly chosen by homeopath) is required to treat / cure the patient and this is amenable to proof in a homeopathically valid well structured double blind trial. Such trials do not seem to have been carried out as on date according to the published literature - at least not in India.

It is not a requirement of a double blind protocol that only a single remedy is used. Protocols can be made to allow for standard homeopathic practice.


E. The effects of a COMBINATION (mixed set of remedies of one or more potencies) ( non classical homeopathy) can NEVER be predicted - although many claims are being made of their efficacy in advertisements - and in some countries they are being legally permitted to PATENT the COMBINATION raising the costs and profits level astronomically without any acceptable level -acceptable in this forum - of proof of cure).


We don't really care what your claims are, regarding to combinations or not. Just state what results you claim to be able to achieve, and this is what should be tried.


F. ONLY trials that permit of adherence to the above principles should be carried out (controlled double blind - water vs water potency - 6C (below Avogrado's) in the first set of trials, 30C (beyond Avogadro's) in the second set of trials and any or all potency 3X and above permitted ( all non toxic potencies) in the third set of trials - this potency clause is on account of intractable difference of opinion among homeopaths about how and what works in homeopathy).


I don't get your meaning of this, but it is not important. You can conduct your homeopathy in any way you wish, it is the results that will be judged. Only reservation is if you use very low potency remedies, where the actual pharmaceutical effect of the active content must be taken into account (e.g. if you use 2X Belladonna, and get results that are known to be belladonna effects, you will not have shown anything about homeopathy)

9. I rest my case.

Excuse me, but did you have a case?



Hans

[kieran]

BSM and Hans seem to have gone through your points/comments/questions one-by-one, but I'll just add a bit on these ones ...

5. If some besotted homeopath does take up Randi's offer and succeeds should it not rightly be written off in the 5% clause and Randi should resile from his offer on the justified ground that the exception proves the rule (that homeopathy does not work).
The rules about what constitutes will be agreed between the tester and the claimant prior to the test. The test involves at least two stages, a preliminary test to make sure that we aren't all just wasting our time ... and the full test in which tighter statistical controls are applied.

Anyway - what do you care about statistics if you "know" that homoeopathy "works"? Whatever the statistical controls, however big the sample size, homoeopathy should always show through if it "works". Are you saying that you doubt it "works"?

6. So come on state upfront whether a one off like Randi's (unscientific?) offer is acceptable to the highly scientific members of this forum? Because it would most certainly not pass muster at ANY scientific level - homeopathic or conventional.
As you inferred, Randi's offer is indeed unscientific, it is a financial offer - and a considerable one at that. If a homoeopath managed to successfully win the $1M on offer then you can be sure that they will have the complete attention of the scientific community. The results will be analyzed and checked for repeatability by the scientific community - that's what they like to do. If something does actually work, school children could be conducting simple experiments to illustrate it for the next 50 years ...

Again, what do you care about how winning the $1M prize would be perceived if you "know", and are happy to demonstrate to everyone and anyones satisfaction, that homoeopathy "works"?

7. If it is not then really you are giving homeopathy a Hobbson's Choice of success, because you are starting with the unscientific premise that homeopathy does not work and even if it shows 100% cure in 5 successive trials you will reject them under yopur scientific 5% clause
I think you are the one claiming that homoeopathy works in any cases - and that is the only unscientific premise here because you have still not provided one shred of credible evidence to the contrary.

You appear to be a bit slow on this one so I'll try to spell it out as others have already done ... a 100% cure in 5 successive trials is completely meaningless ... please stop refering to it as it only shows how little you really understand. Think about it ... someone wins the lottery almost every week - the odds against a particular person winning the lottery are astronomical, yet someone does ... why is that? :confused: (Hint: Think about how many people actually didn't win.)

If you are claiming that you get 100% all the time - great, lets test it.
If you are cherry picking a handful of cases which were conducted in the complete absence of controls, and claiming it has some meaning, then you are only fooling yourself.

- the 5% clause has no real scientific basis - it is only a priori. It could just as well be .5% or .05 % depending on the level of significance.

I'm hoping you'll stop inventing excuses soon as you are going through the full set ... untestability, already "proven", conspiracy cover-up, statistical significance ...

Guess what, others have been down all these routes before (e.g. dowsers) - they finally get to a preliminary test, and they fail miserably but still they look for excuses (blaming the tests they previously agreed to!). You'd think they'd test themselves in private before letting thenselves look so stupid in public ... there is nothing stopping them ... and there is nothing stopping homoeopaths. Do a personal test today - tell us how you get on ...

[Mojo]

8. I suggest that if you want to be scientific - consider the homeopaths circumstance:

...

B. No one SINGLE remedy can treat / cure any particular disease of the patient with 100% success rate.

C. No specified disease can be treated by one specific SINGLE remedy alone with 100% success rate.


I doubt very much that any treatment, of any kind, has a 100% success rate.

But a 100% success rate is not necessary to demonstrate that a treatment is effective: all you need to do is to demonstrate a greater improvement in patients given the treatment than in patients given a placebo.

Can you suggest a single remedy that can cure any particular disease with a 50% success rate?

A 30% success rate?

20%?

10%?

5%?

Even at these lower success rates, it can still be tested against placebo: you'll just need bigger sample sizes to adequately demonstrate the effect.

[krazyKemist]

I will answer some of the questions to the best of my knowledge...

I have been busy analyzing the 600 plus posts in this thread. Hence the delay in posting.

Some fundamental questions and some major observations:

1. Are you saying that all categories of disease would get better in 5% of cases (Post #1 & c) without treatment of any kind?

For my part, no. It depends on :

-the nature of the disease (some diseases do disappear without intervention at a higher rate than others, the body fights them naturally without help)

-the nature of the test. Example:the perception of pain is very susceptible to the placebo effect. One study made on glucosamine even reported a strong placebo effect in 65% of subjects !!!

2. Are you then saying that cases of cancers (Staged, Graded, Typed) that have shown very low long term (18 to 24 months) cure rates of below 2% with chemotherapy would achieve 5% cure rate in the absence of all treatment?

Cure, or event-free survival rate above 5 years ? Cancers are rarely considered cured, but rather in remisssion. In that case yes, it can happen, with poor cure rate cancers, in which the use of chemo is debatable. Chemotherapy agents are not exactly harmless, especially if you are reduced to the third line drugs (which will happen in case of poor response).

5. If some besotted homeopath does take up Randi's offer and succeeds should it not rightly be written off in the 5% clause and Randi should resile from his offer on the justified ground that the exception proves the rule (that homeopathy does not work).

6. So come on state upfront whether a one off like Randi's (unscientific?) offer is acceptable to the highly scientific members of this forum? Because it would most certainly not pass muster at ANY scientific level - homeopathic or conventional.

7. If it is not then really you are giving homeopathy a Hobbson's Choice of success, because you are starting with the unscientific premise that homeopathy does not work and even if it shows 100% cure in 5 successive trials you will reject them under yopur scientific 5% clause - the 5% clause has no real scientific basis - it is only a priori. It could just as well be .5% or .05 % depending on the level of significance.

I think there is some misunderstanding of the scientific method and scientists here. You make an hypothesis : homeopathy does work. We have an alternative one : it does not. Those two are just opposing models. Neither is unscientific. You have reasons to believe it works, we have reasons to believe it does not. Science gives us tools to evaluate the value of these reasons. A scientist is a person with his/her own vision of the world, and those visions will often differ greatly. Einstein, for example, never accepted quantum theory, even if, as a model, it has enormous predictive power, which is the mark of a good model.

8. I suggest that if you want to be scientific - consider the homeopaths circumstance:

A. Any one SINGLE remedy can produce one or more different symptoms from the expected set of symptoms of the provings but symptoms can not be restricted to the provings data alone.

B. No one SINGLE remedy can treat / cure any particular disease of the patient with 100% success rate.

C. No specified disease can be treated by one specific SINGLE remedy alone with 100% success rate.

D. A well chosen SINGLE remedy (alternatively, a set of SINGLE remedies if properly chosen by homeopath) is required to treat / cure the patient and this is amenable to proof in a homeopathically valid well structured double blind trial. Such trials do not seem to have been carried out as on date according to the published literature - at least not in India.

E. The effects of a COMBINATION (mixed set of remedies of one or more potencies) ( non classical homeopathy) can NEVER be predicted - although many claims are being made of their efficacy in advertisements - and in some countries they are being legally permitted to PATENT the COMBINATION raising the costs and profits level astronomically without any acceptable level -acceptable in this forum - of proof of cure).

F. ONLY trials that permit of adherence to the above principles should be carried out (controlled double blind - water vs water potency - 6C (below Avogrado's) in the first set of trials, 30C (beyond Avogadro's) in the second set of trials and any or all potency 3X and above permitted ( all non toxic potencies) in the third set of trials - this potency clause is on account of intractable difference of opinion among homeopaths about how and what works in homeopathy).

Consider this: conventional medicine had to prove that every single treatment was efficient. That is an awful amount of work, done over generations of researchers and doctors. That work has never been done properly by homeopathic medicine. It would also be a huge amount of work, that has to be done little by little. Begin with sound documentation and follow-up. Be honest and show your failures as well as your successes, as conventional medicine does. That is how research actually makes a discipline better.

9. I rest my case.

Thank you for the very valuable discussion.

Regards.

Sarvadaman Oberoi
H 485 FF Ansals Palam Vihar
Gurgaon 122017 Haryana INDIA
Mobile: +919818768349 Tele: +911244076374
Website: http://www.freewebs.com/homeopathy249/index.htm
email: manioberoi@gmail.com

It's been a pleasure. And if you intend to begin testing, good luck.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

I will answer some of the questions to the best of my knowledge...



For my part, no. It depends on :

-the nature of the disease (some diseases do disappear without intervention at a higher rate than others, the body fights them naturally without help)

-the nature of the test. Example:the perception of pain is very susceptible to the placebo effect. One study made on glucosamine even reported a strong placebo effect in 65% of subjects !!!



Cure, or event-free survival rate above 5 years ? Cancers are rarely considered cured, but rather in remisssion. In that case yes, it can happen, with poor cure rate cancers, in which the use of chemo is debatable. Chemotherapy agents are not exactly harmless, especially if you are reduced to the third line drugs (which will happen in case of poor response).



I think there is some misunderstanding of the scientific method and scientists here. You make an hypothesis : homeopathy does work. We have an alternative one : it does not. Those two are just opposing models. Neither is unscientific. You have reasons to believe it works, we have reasons to believe it does not. Science gives us tools to evaluate the value of these reasons. A scientist is a person with his/her own vision of the world, and those visions will often differ greatly. Einstein, for example, never accepted quantum theory, even if, as a model, it has enormous predictive power, which is the mark of a good model.



Consider this: conventional medicine had to prove that every single treatment was efficient. That is an awful amount of work, done over generations of researchers and doctors. That work has never been done properly by homeopathic medicine. It would also be a huge amount of work, that has to be done little by little. Begin with sound documentation and follow-up. Be honest and show your failures as well as your successes, as conventional medicine does. That is how research actually makes a discipline better.



It's been a pleasure. And if you intend to begin testing, good luck.

the Kemist
It was a fruitful discussion.
This real life case provides food for thought and hence I am posting it here:

"American Homeopath (_Am_Hom) 1998
As if one patient (Greg Bedayn) Angustura vera Case About six years ago there was an article in the San Francisco Chronicle about an epidemic that was killing the northern California sheep population. They referred to it as "Ergot poisoning" and one of the finest schools of Veterinary Science in the country, the University of California at Davis, had thrown up their hands in frustration and called it "an act of God," or something similarly provocative for a homeopath. I dialed the operator and asked for the phone number of the two ranchers named in the article. I called both, the second one had many sheep that were affected and we had a long conversation. I was told that ergot smut is a seasonal mold that grows on the autumn grass found on the typically foggy California coast, but it grows only in the absence of rain, which would otherwise wash it off. Some years the rains come early and there is no problem; other years the rains come late and there is a substantial loss of livestock due to complications arising from the poisonings that continue sometimes for up to five months. The sheep's symptoms were of a neuralgic-convulsive sort. The stricken animals would quiver and shake and then get so stiff they could no longer balance their bodies over their feet; they would topple-over onto the ground and then bounce around a bit in an effort to right themselves. Anxiety mounting, their seizure would only worsen if approached by man or beast. They would die within an hour or two if not rescued by a rancher. It is interesting to note that when the ranchers found sheep in this state, they would hold their hand over the animal's eyes, and slowly the animal would calm down and allow itself to be lifted to its feet, at which point it would gallop off. The ranch terrain is mostly steep hills, and if stricken on the side of a steep slope, the sheep would fall then pitch-pole, end over end, down the hill -a frightful sight. The ranches involved were 200-2,000 acres each, with a total population of approximately 10,000 animals. Many of the animals were dying daily. The rancher videotaped the evening feeding process and mailed it to me -saying he was interested in homeopathy if it could help his animals. The video showed some of the symptoms very clearly, so I started packing a field-kit of remedies; Cicuta, Lolium, Ustilago, Strychninum, Nux vomica, Solanum nigrum, Secale as an isode, and a few others. I telephoned the late great George Macleod, in Scotland, and he suggested I try Belladonna followed by Strychninum. Before I could journey to the ranches and apply the remedies, the rains came and washed the mold off the grass, new grass sprouted almost immediately, giving the sheep toxin-free food -the seasonal episode was over. Then, in November 1995, (six years later), the first rancher from the newspaper article called me and said a new episode of toxicity had started and would I come out and take a look at his herd. A few days later, I gathered my travel kit and a homeopathcolleague, Sarah Nielsen, RN, and we drove to the ranch, located a few miles inland from Tomales Bay, about one hour drive north from San Francisco. We arrived and inspected the herd at their morning meal. There were two distinctly different problem-groups. For example, some of the lambs were suffering from failure to thrive and a marasmus, which we repertorized in general as emaciation. The lambs were from just hours, to 5 days old and looked markedly emaciated. Some appeared as if they did not know how to suckle. Many of the lambs were gaunt, back arched up, head hanging down with droopy ears. The sheep, on the other hand, had no emaciation but instead had a transient ataxia made worse from touch or loud noises. These "shakers" would become anxious when approached, and, if we moved in close to touch them, their shaking would suddenly get much worse, and, trying to run away, they would usually fall down into a position of opisthotonos (head thrown back, chest bowed out, limbs straight and rigid). Once they had fallen down, their breathing would usually get faster and faster in fits of increasing anxiety. In extreme cases the mouth would open and the tongue would appear thickened; the air passage seemed to be cut off with an accelerated heart rate; death would follow. Just before death, they would often go into a frenzied fit; eyes bulging, lips pulled back tight on the teeth in trismus, the body in tetanic rigidity. Repeatedly I asked the ranchers, in differing ways, if there was any incidence of gangrene, bleeding, uterine symptoms, or any discharges from the sheep, in an attempt to confirm that the symptoms were indeed caused by ergot poisoning (Secale). Repeatedly I was told there were no such symptoms. I read everything I could find on Ergot and Ergotism. This source has an interesting history, being the substance from which Lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) is made; these ranches happened to be in Marin County, where much of the "Acid Generation" of the 1960's was spawned and I grew excited, anticipating a case of "Metaphorical Naturalism" -where the in-nature characteristics of the simillimum are reflected in the characteristics of the patient. I also uncovered stories of how, during the American colonial period, the Salem witch trials involved people who had been surreptitiously poisoned with ergot (Claviceps purpura) causing a convulsive, hallucinogenic state which was often the sole reason that they were burned at the stake as witches. While the symptoms of ergotism were somewhat similar to our sheep's symptoms, ours had no discharges, no uterine symptoms, no hemorrhages, and no symptoms of gangrene -at least one of which we would like to see in Secale poisoning. I pondered what LSD and the Salem witch-hunts might have to do with these staggering/dying sheep but decided to look beyond Secale, based on the lack of any confirming symptoms of ergot poisoning. At about that time, the UC Davis team produced a paper written on the subject of the New Zealand Ryegrass Staggers -referring to a seasonal poisoning-epidemic in sheep caused by the toxic endophyte, Acremonium lolii. These symptoms matched those of our sheep perfectly and I felt that it must have been the Acremonium which had activated the sheep's predisposed susceptibility to their transientataxia made worse by anticipation of being touched. This was showing up as a presentation of individualized susceptibility, or non-specific resistance. That is to say, all the sheep ate the same grass but not all the sheep were affected in the same way; only the susceptible sheep were affected by the toxin. (This is a crucial key to understanding chronic disease that western medicine blindly ignores). At this point I felt it was possible to cure the herd of this problem, if we could find the genus epidemicus; a single remedy selected for the entire population based on the totality of symptoms of that population, as if it were one patient. "The most important sentence in homeopathy is 'as if one person.''' -Jeremy Sherr, Homeonet 1996 A repertorization of the sheeps' general symptoms brought up two rubrics that caught my eye: 'Stiffening out of body' and 'Fear touch,' which seemed to be at the crux of the problem. After graphing these with 'Emaciation' (in the lambs), the main remedy choices in the Complete Repertory (with MacRepertory analysis set to: totality, small remedies, and rare-strange-and-peculiar remedies) were: Arnica, Ignatia, Cina, Ipecacuanha, Chamomilla, Cuprum, Angustura vera, Ferrum- phosphorica, Stramonium, Phosphorous, Plumbum, and Camphora. After some thought, we weren't satisfied with any of the polychrests so we studied Angustura. Angustura vera was first proven by Hahnemann and is listed in his Materia Medica Pura (1827). It is made from the bitter bark of the Galipoea cusparius-officinalis tree from Venezuela (Hahnemann mistakenly refers to it as Bonplandia trifoliata in his Materia Medica Pura). Its local reputation was almost as significant as that of Cinchona bark as a febrifuge in certain fevers, and as an allopathic suppressant for discharges. (Note: The ever popular gastronomic-tonic "Angustura aromatic bitters" is not made from Angustura but was originally made in the town of Angustura in Venezuela, after which it was named). Hahnemann talks about the symptoms of Angustura poisoning: Trembling, soon passing into violent convulsions. When touched, tetanus suddenly ensued. Eyelids wide open. Trismus, with wide separation of the lips, so that the teeth were quite exposed. Limbs stretched out to the utmost, stiff, and stark. The spinal column and head strongly drawn backwards. The trunk was from time to time shaken by violent jerking along the back, as from electric shocks, and somewhat raised. Respiration intermitting. Death after an hour. Half an hour after death the body was stiff and stark. These being the exact symptoms of the sheep, I packed the remedy with instructions and shipped it to the ranch. Two weeks later, the rancher called me to report they had given the Angustura vera 12c daily to the orphaned lambs as instructed in their formula, and to the general sheep population in their water troughs. I had written detailed instructions on how to charge-up gallon containers of distilled water and then charge the community water troughs with them, which they did religiously every day for one week. The lambs that had been suffering from marasmus had leapt back to the land of the living, with remarkable growth and renewed vitality -it amazed the ranchers who had been hopeful yet skeptical. The sheep stopped shaking and falling over; it was a short tapered resolution -the acute symptoms of toxicity were over. Then it rained, washing off the existing mold; the green grass popped up and the sheep's intake of the toxins stopped. I remember thinking at the time I'd have liked to have had more time to test and confirm the limits of the curative potential of Angustura with this herd, but the seasonal episode of endophyte proliferation was now passing until the following autumn. This process showed us the true genius of the genus epidemicus, in that the same remedy cured both the lambs and the sheep, each of a different pathology. Only the lambs had emaciation -the sheep had totally different symptoms -the shaking/stiffness, which grew worse from touch. By finding a remedy that was indicated for both sets of symptoms, and by treating the entire population as one patient, we discovered Hahnemann's genus epidemicus. It is interesting to note that the sick lambs were mostly orphans, and had not had mother's milk. It is possible they were exposed to the toxin in-utero. Sarah found Angustura listed in the rubric 'trismus neonatorum' which might explain the lambs' inability to suckle. Then something quite unexpected happened. Two weeks after the sheep were given the first dose of Angustura, an unusually violent storm swept over Northern California. It devastated the subject ranch which is located on the tallest hills within sight of the ocean at Tomales Bay, approximately 45 miles north of San Francisco. The winds were clocked at 100+ mph. The roof was blown off the barn, as were the barn doors. It blew a 2,500-gallon steel water tank through the air one-and-a-half miles until it crashed into a distant neighbor's building. Most trees, fences, and gates were destroyed by the high winds. Before first light the following morning, the ranchers went out in the onslaught searching with flashlights for animals in trouble. They found twenty-four new lambs that had not lived through the night, dead from exposure. There is a peculiar symptom with the local ewes that they tend to birth during storms. It appears to be a contraction response from their fear of the storm. Another theory is that during storms the predators are too busy avoiding the elements to be on the prowl for new lambs so the birthing sheep tends to deliver during stormy weather. The husband and wife team were clearly grief-stricken as they gathered their dead lambs on the truck to take for burial. The woman-rancher relates the following story: "I saw Gordon pick up one of the lambs and just as he was putting it on the truck he stopped and turned it over a few times -he said he thought he had seen its ear twitch -so I took it up the hill to the house and put it in front of our wood-burning stove on a pad and left it while I checked the house for damage (I should mention that this same lamb had had one eye pecked out the day before by a crow). The electricity had gone out during the night and we had no phone. I checked the lamb periodically -it was not breathing and had no pulse. I held it in my arms and rubbed it and sang softly to it but it seemed to be going into rigor mortis." Half an hour after death the body was stiff. "I felt so defeated, I wept. Gordon came in and we just sat in silence together with the dead lamb at our feet. For some reason I decided we should decorate the Christmas tree to take our minds off our problems. With flashlights we began to hang ornaments, then I remembered the story you told me..." During my first visit to the ranch, I had seen a newborn lamb lying dead on the barn floor when I arrived in the morning. It was such a disturbing sight; this lifeless caricature of youth. Later that afternoon, the woman rancher noticed me staring at the dead lamb and told me that she thought she had seen it move, so I immediately kneeled down and gave it a squirt of Cicuta 1M which I had with me, but to no avail -she looked at me and said "Now that would really impress me!" So I told her the story about how Dr. Stuart Close had once treated a 45-year-old woman who had already been pronounced dead, on site, by her family physicians. Close arrived at the residence as the relatives were standing around the parlor, drying tears, etc.; he quickly examined the patient. No radial pulse, limbs cold and rigid, face with an expression of death, both feet and legs were gangrenous up to the knees -the living manifestation of death. He tapped a few pellets of Arsenicum 45M (Fincke) under her lip and rubbed it against her gum. "Presently she opened her eyes and looked at me as I bent over her, and whispered to me 'I'm coming back.' In ten minutes more she was talking to me in an audible voice, asking questions about herself and what had happened. I had difficulty keeping my patient quiet and had to prevent her from talking. Reaction had come on with a vengeance. She went on to make an uneventful recovery and has led a healthy life for these 20 years past." So, with this story in mind, the woman rancher got the bottle of Strychninum 12c (in water) and put a few drops on the lambs nostrils. She relates: "Instantaneously the lamb twitched and jerked around a bit and shook, then went still again. I could hear the heartbeat; then it slowed and stopped again. I gave him another few drops of the remedy and the same thing happened. Then I put a squirt of Angustura vera down the lambs throat and with that he simply leapt back to life! Within ten minutes he was up and walking and would not let us alone as we decorated the Christmas tree in the early morning twilight, rubbing his little head against our legs to show us his gratitude." By the following morning, the lamb was doing so well that they put him out in a pen, and he's done quite well since. He turned into a husky little lamb and they've named him "One-eyed Jack." I was stunned when I received this information. It was enough that the single remedy had acted on the entire herd for differing pathologies, but to bring back the dead! One week later the woman rancher called to ask advice on how to follow-up on a sheep that had been attacked by a coyote: its throat had been torn open and the esophagus was punctured. Wide eyed and terrified, the sheep would not calm down. A hissing sound came from the punctured throat as she breathed. The rancher had only the remedies I had left there earlier to test on the staggering sheep. No Aconite, no Stramonium, no Opium, no Arnica, no Calendula, etc. Not being able to reach me at first for advice, the desperate rancher had given it a dose of Angustura. The sheep immediately calmed down to the point where they could approach it and touch it. This sheep went on to have an uneventful recovery. A few days later, the rancher called me again. Another lamb had been similarly attacked by a coyote and had open wounds on its ear, throat and jaw with much swelling, and it was acting extremely frightened. It was almost impossible to herd her into the corral. Again they squirted a stream of Angustura that made contact with the animal's nose and it immediately calmed down and even walked up to the woman rancher and nibbled on her tattered coat-tail. This would have been an unusual display of ease in a typically pusillanimous sheep, rare in one who, only moments before, had been so terrorized. We felt this to be very significant. The woman rancher commented on how the entire herd had become much more approachable and less skittish since the prophylactic watering-trough dosings of Angustura. I feel this case shows the broadly curative potential of the genus epidemicus/simillimum. The single remedy showed curative action on acute poisoning-epidemic symptoms as a specific, on chronic symptoms (pusillanimous/shyness), and on acute firstaid symptoms (terror, open wounds), in one herd of animals including a subgroup that was possibly made toxic in-utero. I would like to spend more time testing the limits of Angustura vera on this herd. I have since given the entire herd on this one ranch (as a control) a single dose of Angustura vera 10M, to see if it will permanently shift their susceptibility to the ryegrass staggers, as I suspect it will. Greg Bedayn, RSHom (NA), CCH, lives and practices in Lafayette, California. gbedaynaol. com -Fax: 510-930-9540"

[MRC_Hans]

So, manoberoi, I have to conclude that you have understood absolutely nothing of this "fruitful discussion". If you had understood even a little bit, you would not have posted yet another wordy anecdote.

I will give you yet one chance. Read very carefully because I will say this only once:

We don't give a damn about your anecdotes. Anecdotes are not acceptable as evidence.

Get it?

Hans

[Professor Yaffle]

Paragraphs are your friend...

[Mojo]

Two weeks after the sheep were given the first dose of Angustura, an unusually violent storm swept over Northern California. It devastated the subject ranch which is located on the tallest hills within sight of the ocean at Tomales Bay, approximately 45 miles north of San Francisco. The winds were clocked at 100+ mph. The roof was blown off the barn, as were the barn doors. It blew a 2,500-gallon steel water tank through the air one-and-a-half miles until it crashed into a distant neighbor's building. Most trees, fences, and gates were destroyed by the high winds.


And they say that homoeopathy has no side-effects...

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

And they say that homoeopathy has no side-effects...

We are all connected by the cosmic energy Brother Mojo.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

It was a fruitful discussion.
This real life case provides food for thought and hence I am posting it here:

"American Homeopath (_Am_Hom) 1998
As if one patient (Greg Bedayn) Angustura vera Case About six years ago there was an article in the San Francisco Chronicle about an [about an utterly pointless anecdote]

Manioberoi, I'm afraid this is just getting to be pathetic. As Hans has said, please get this into your head once and for all: anecdotes such as this convey absolutely no weight whatsoever. Please understand that they simply do not exist on our spectrum of evidence. Just stop it now.

You have still failed to answer my question and repeatedly show yourself ignorant of why it is so important. So, please answer it now;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[krazyKemist]

Where has that guy Ullman gone ?

I wanted to discuss his important chemistry paper... and the definition of the word "nano"...

the Kemist

[Michael C]

Where has that guy Ullman gone ?

A while ago in this thread, Gully/Ullman said he'd be away for two weeks. In a few days we'll see if he has any more to say.

[Mojo]

Manioberoi seems to have done a runner as well.

[George152]

[QUOTE=manioberoi;2723288]It was a fruitful discussion.
This real life case provides food for thought and hence I am posting it here:

"American Homeopath (_Am_Hom) 1998
As if one patient (Greg Bedayn) Angustura vera Case About six years ago there was an article in the San Francisco Chronicle about an epidemic that was killing the northern California sheep population. They referred to it as "Ergot poisoning" and one of the finest schools of Veterinary Science in the country, the University of California at Davis, had thrown up their hands in frustration and called it "an act of God," or something similarly provocative for a homeopath.

Well seeing that the claim is for 'ergot poisoning' I'll tell you how to cure it.
Put the sheep in a well eaten out (little or no grass) paddock for several days until the ergot is out of their system.
We had to deal with this every year as our main stock fodder was Ryegrass.
Symptoms were the sheep moving in tight cirles and losing balance.
Easily treated and definitely not fatal

[Rolfe]

It can be disabling or fatal. The poison causes the blood vessels to constrict and you can get bits of the extremities turning black or falling off. It's nasty.

But I really don't see the guys at Davis throwing up their hands in despair. It's well understood, and managing an outbreak is well understood.

Rolfe.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Manioberoi seems to have done a runner as well.

I think I have said it before, but when I first started paying serious attention to homeopathy I was very circumspect in my criticism, but time and again we see the same pattern of evasion and cowardice as soon as tricky questions are posed. It's not just that they are stupid or ignorant, but that they actively flee from the opportunity to examine their beliefs.

[George152]

The only reason that animals could reach such an advanced stage is a lack of knowledge and very poor stockmanship.
Such as displayed by homeopathetic practicioners...

[JJM]

I don't recall if Gully/Ullman brought this up here. Over at Orac's, he submitted that a 2005 article in Chest verified the use of a homeopathic prep. Today, Orac has analyzed that article (and refers to other analyses) and found it wanting. http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/07/homeopathy_in_thecringeicu_1.php

[krazyKemist]

What worries me is his observation about conventional medicine being slowly and quite stealthily invaded by woo. I've obseved this too. In Canada, we even have at least one university that boasts a chiropratic faculty.

One culprit for this here is the significant reduction of scientific education a doctor receives. Basic science has been taken out of the curriculum to make place for a debatable patient-doctor relationship segment. I say debatable because the capacity to deal with patients should be tested at the beginning, as a human trait. If you can't do it, better not be a doctor.

As a result of this, doctors rarely even know how clinical research is done. And dont ask them how a drug is developped ! Most doctors could not guess what I was doing when I told them I was a organic chemist. How could they tell if someone is using scientific terms abusively ?

I wonder if medical education has been modified the same way elsewhere ? In the patch-adams patient-relashionship way ?

the Kemist

[JJM]

What worries me is his observation about conventional medicine being slowly and quite stealthily invaded by woo. I've obseved this too. In Canada, we even have at least one university that boasts a chiropratic faculty.Are you sure? A few years ago York U. almost merged with a chiro school; but then declined. If it had gone through, it would have been the first such combination. You can read about it at www.quackwatch.com (http://www.quackwatch.com) .

As for Orac's observation that woo is invading medicine. If you go back to http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/ and search for "medical education" (the quote marks are important) you can read quite a bit about it.
One culprit for this here is the significant reduction of scientific education a doctor receives. Basic science has been taken out of the curriculum to make place for a debatable patient-doctor relationship segment. {snip}

As a result of this, doctors rarely even know how clinical research is done. And dont ask them how a drug is developped ! Most doctors could not guess what I was doing when I told them I was a organic chemist. How could they tell if someone is using scientific terms abusively ? {snip}

the KemistThe problem begins before medical school. While I hate philosophy- science has two components 1) a method of obtaining knowledge and 2) the body of knowledge thus obtained. In college, we emphasize the body of knowledge over the method. That gives students the idea science is all about authoritative claims. Then, when medical students encounter a chiropractor (homeopath, acupuncturist etc.), they are unprepared to analyze claims enunciated by another "authority."

[krazyKemist]

Are you sure? A few years ago York U. almost merged with a chiro school; but then declined. If it had gone through, it would have been the first such combination. You can read about it at www.quackwatch.com (http://www.quackwatch.com) .



Yep, quite sure. Went there a couple months ago for a conference. It is the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR), Quebec, Canada.

http://www.uqtr.ca

We in quebec do love to be the first ones to do stupid things. Such as stopping failing elementary school students when they are not up to scratch.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

I don't recall if Gully/Ullman brought this up here. Over at Orac's, he submitted that a 2005 article in Chest verified the use of a homeopathic prep. Today, Orac has analyzed that article (and refers to other analyses) and found it wanting. http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2007/07/homeopathy_in_thecringeicu_1.php
Welcome back after your well earned rest of two weeks.
After reading Orac's comments I would tend to agree with you that there are serious holes in that study.
To eliminate such fatal errors the discussion had focussed on ways and means to set up a reproducable, verifiable and scientifically acceptable series of pilot studies in homeopathic treatment - if this results in acceptable levels of curative effects being observed - full scale series of homeopathic trials could be set up to investigate the efficacy of homeopathic treatments - none of these studies would be negated merely on the ground that they are chemically tested (at the present stage of technology) to be placebo.

Your valuable comments on the post #485 #520 #534 would add value to this discussion.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Meanwhile...

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[steenkh]

Meanwhile...

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?
By now it is clear that the answer is:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v411/hells/lala.gif

[kieran]

Welcome back after your well earned rest of two weeks.
Seconded.

After reading Orac's comments I would tend to agree with you that there are serious holes in that study.
To eliminate such fatal errors the discussion had focussed on ways and means to set up a reproducable, verifiable and scientifically acceptable series of pilot studies in homeopathic treatment - if this results in acceptable levels of curative effects being observed - full scale series of homeopathic trials could be set up to investigate the efficacy of homeopathic treatments - none of these studies would be negated merely on the ground that they are chemically tested (at the present stage of technology) to be placebo.
I agree with virtually all of this paragraph. However, I'm a bit confused by the bit at the end so I'll hold judgement while I await clarification. I would be grateful if you could elaborate on what you are saying with your "none of these studies would be negated ..." caveat. Can you give me an example of a situation that could arise in which this condition would be activated?
Your valuable comments on the post #485 #520 #534 would add value to this discussion.
JJM - I think all of the posts manioberoi listed above have already been commented on by others - but manioberoi seems to need a personal statement from you on these ... I think you have his respect/attention ... :o

[Mojo]

JJM - I think all of the posts manioberoi listed above have already been commented on by others - but manioberoi seems to need a personal statement from you on these ... I think you have his respect/attention ... :o


Actually, the "welcome back after your well earned rest of two weeks" makes me suspect that manioberoi has mistaken JJM for JamesGully.

[kieran]

Actually, the "welcome back after your well earned rest of two weeks" makes me suspect that manioberoi has mistaken JJM for JamesGully.
I was also wondering that. I can remember JamesGully telling us he wouldn't be around for a couple of weeks ... but I also looked back to see when JJM last posted in this thread before yesterday and it seemed about two weeks - but I am too lazy to get exact dates ...

I am having slightly scary thoughts .... do we have any evidence that JJM and JG are not in fact the same person? :jaw-dropp

... or maybe they went on holiday together ...

... or maybe it's just coincidence - a bit like when homoepathic remedies "work" ...

[JJM]

JJM - I think all of the posts manioberoi listed above have already been commented on by others - but manioberoi seems to need a personal statement from you on these ... I think you have his respect/attention ... :oI don't know how you people can correspond with him, I find him incoherent. How is that for a personal statement?
Actually, the "welcome back after your well earned rest of two weeks" makes me suspect that manioberoi has mistaken JJM for JamesGully.The "well-earned rest" from engaging homeopaths continues.
I was also wondering that. I can remember JamesGully telling us he wouldn't be around for a couple of weeks ... but I also looked back to see when JJM last posted in this thread before yesterday and it seemed about two weeks - but I am too lazy to get exact dates ...

I am having slightly scary thoughts .... do we have any evidence that JJM and JG are not in fact the same person? :jaw-dropp
{snip}I am not JG. Think about it. Remember that one never sees Superman and Clark Kent at the same place. Yet, I am right here with the homeopaths. Anyone with two ears to hear with can see we are distinct.

Gee, that logic makes me sound like a homeopath ...

[kieran]

I am not JG. Think about it. Remember that one never sees Superman and Clark Kent at the same place.

... are you saying that Clark Kent is Superman? :jaw-dropp (I think you could have used a spoiler there ... I've always wanted to use a spoiler on these posts but (i) I don't know how, and (ii) I have nothing suitable to "hide".)

Yet, I am right here with the homeopaths. Anyone with two ears to hear with can see we are distinct.

Gee, that logic makes me sound like a homeopath ...

(Completely ignoring the presence of JJM as it would mess up my ill-formed ideas ...) I'm starting to form a hypothesis here ... when we dilute the presence of JamesGully to infinitely small levels (i.e. he goes away for two weeks) then there is a mechanism by which the threads lose the memory of JJM .. and he also disappears. Check it out for yourself on this thread. It's a kind of inverse homoeopathy but for "people" on "message boards". I might start my own journal and lists lots of anecdotes to illustrate it, and discussing mechanisms by which message boards could support the concept of forgetfulness. I might possibly make some money if I sell them as "natural" message boards ...:)

[kieran]

I don't know how you people can correspond with him, I find him incoherent. How is that for a personal statement?
I think his level of "incoherency", whilst somewhat oscillitary, is tending downwards. He appears to have (for the moment) given up trying to claim that homoeopathy is untestable, and I am hoping that that it is slowly sinking in that his cut'n'paste anecdotes are irrelevant.

manioberoi - what was wrong/missing from the responses you got from others here to posts #485 #520 #534?
(It looks like you are going to have to move on without JJM's direct feedback.)

[Mojo]

Although some medical historians have referred to Gully as a hydrotherapist, this is just the historians way of writing homeopathy out of history.


I've checked out Gully's entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (generally regarded as a pretty authoritative source of biographical information on British figures). No mention of homoeopathy there: he's described as "physician and hydropath". It also says he became "a fervent believer in spiritualism". And then of course there's the Bravo case.

So the best example for homeopathy in the thread so far is someone who lived almost 200 years ago and wasn't actually a homeopath? Sounds par for the course.


He may be considered a good example by homoeopaths because, according to the probate records referenced by the DNB, his wealth at death was £29,823 12s. 4d. That's in excess of £2,000,000 in today's money.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

I see manioberoi is adopting another favourite tactic of our homeopathic visitors, the post and run.

I do wish he would answer this question;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

Do you know what? I don't think he dare answer it. It would mean he'd have to do some independent thinking instead of relying on copying other people's (invariably daft) ideas.

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

p.s. JamesGully last posted here on the 19th June. Will he return? Does anyone care? What's the betting he'll still find himself incapable of answering a number of simple questions.

4. Can you tell us whether either of these machines works?

http://www.bio-resonance.com/elybra.htm

http://www.remedydevices.com/voice.htm

Bear in mind that the users of these machines rely on exactly the same anecdotal experience and fallacious post hoc reasoning that every other homeopath does. Are the homeopaths who use these machines right or wrong in thinking they work?

It's a very simple question and capable of a single-word answer.

I'll give you a new question just so you can show how well you understand the interpretation of clinical trial data;

9. I set a p-value for significance of 0.05 and run 100 trials. In no trial is the test substance distinguishable from the control. How many trials can I expect to show an apparent "effect" from my test substance?

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

What is it about thinking for themselves that so scares homeopaths? Frightened of letting go of Mummy's apron strings, perhaps.

[malbui]

I could have sworn that many pages ago we were told to expect a big bomb that would cause us all to reconsider our scorn for homeopathy. Did I miss it or has it simply not appeared yet?

[Pipirr]

I could have sworn that many pages ago we were told to expect a big bomb that would cause us all to reconsider our scorn for homeopathy. Did I miss it or has it simply not appeared yet?


James Gully has been reticient on what da big bomb actually will be.

Going on what he has said in this thread so far, I suspect it's Rustum Roy's upcoming publication in the journal Homeopathy. Details are scant at the present time, but expect lots of abuse of the concept of epitaxy, and fuzzy spectral analysis. Go here (http://rustumroy.com/May%2016th%20Webinar.pdf)for details.

If not Roy, then it may have been the story that Charles Darwin once used the services of a homeopath. Named, coincidentally, James Gully. There's probably going to be a book about it soon.

[Mojo]

If not Roy, then it may have been the story that Charles Darwin once used the services of a homeopath. Named, coincidentally, James Gully. There's probably going to be a book about it soon.


A book coincidentally written by Dana Ullman.

[krazyKemist]

Going on what he has said in this thread so far, I suspect it's Rustum Roy's upcoming publication in the journal Homeopathy. Details are scant at the present time, but expect lots of abuse of the concept of epitaxy, and fuzzy spectral analysis. Go here (http://rustumroy.com/May%2016th%20Webinar.pdf)for details.



This guy needs somebody to gift him a book on thermodynamics fast.

Any reviewer whom doesn't question him on that is a total blibbering idiot. Well I guess he can only publish this trash in Homeopathy.

the Kemist

[manioberoi]

Meanwhile...

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?
I do not remember a whisper of comment on my post :
#647
Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.
Not so easy to write the epitaph of homeopathy.

[manioberoi]

p.s. JamesGully last posted here on the 19th June. Will he return? Does anyone care? What's the betting he'll still find himself incapable of answering a number of simple questions.

4. Can you tell us whether either of these machines works?

http://www.bio-resonance.com/elybra.htm

http://www.remedydevices.com/voice.htm

Bear in mind that the users of these machines rely on exactly the same anecdotal experience and fallacious post hoc reasoning that every other homeopath does. Are the homeopaths who use these machines right or wrong in thinking they work?

It's a very simple question and capable of a single-word answer.

I'll give you a new question just so you can show how well you understand the interpretation of clinical trial data;

9. I set a p-value for significance of 0.05 and run 100 trials. In no trial is the test substance distinguishable from the control. How many trials can I expect to show an apparent "effect" from my test substance?
I did see that Dana Ullman said "No comments" on that one. It would be tricky to comment one way or the other without a knowledge of the occult, which none of us has been gifted with.

As far as regular classical homeopathy is concerned those two treatments do not find a place in the regular homeopathic practice.

[kieran]

I do not remember a whisper of comment on my post :
#647
Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.
Not so easy to write the epitaph of homeopathy.

Relevant part of that post included here ...

Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.
"Inhibition of chemically induced carcinogenesis by drugs used in homeopathic medicine.
Kumar KH, Sunila ES, Kuttan G, Preethi KC, Venugopal CN, Kuttan R.
Amala Cancer Research Centre, Amala Nagar, Thrissur, Kerala State, India. 680555. amalaresearch@rediffmail.com.

Homeopathy is considered as one modality for cancer therapy. However, there are only very few clinical reports on the activity of the drugs, as well as in experimental animals. Presently we have evaluated the inhibitory effects of potentized homeopathic preparations against N'-nitrosodiethylamine (NDEA) induced hepatocellular carcinoma in rats as well as 3-methylcholanthrene-induced sarcomas in mice. We have used Ruta, Hydrastis, Lycopodium and Thuja, which are commonly employed in homeopathy for treating cancer. Administration of NDEA in rats resulted in tumor induction in the liver and elevated marker enzymes such as gamma-glutamyl transpeptidase, glutamate pyruvate transaminase, glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase and alkaline phosphatase in the serum and in liver. Concomitant administration of homeopathic drugs retarded the tumor growth and significantly reduced the elevated marker enzymes level as revealed by morphological, biochemical and histopathological evaluation. Out of the four drugs studied, Ruta 200c showed maximum inhibition of liver tumor development. Ruta 200c and phosphorus 1M were found to reduce the incidence of 3-methylcholanthrene-induced sarcomas and also increase the life span of mice harboring the tumours. These studies demonstrate that homeopathic drugs, at ultra low doses, may be able to decrease tumor induction by carcinogen administration. At present we do not know the mechanisms of action of these drugs useful against carcinogenesis."
Where would you like to start ...

The abstract given there gives no indication that any control was applied.
An absolute effect is claimed but the magnitude of that effect is not stated ... what do terms like "significant" mean?

All you put up was a sketchy abstract, maybe my cursory comments are covered fully and answered in the paper, but I don't have access to that ...

[Professor Yaffle]

There's an "interesting" discussion with a homeopath going on here (over several blog posts), if anyone would like to contribute.

http://homeopathy.wildfalcon.com/

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

I do not remember a whisper of comment on my post :
#647
Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.
Not so easy to write the epitaph of homeopathy.

That's not even an attempt to answer the question. The question remains;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

Please cease your evasions they are deeply discourteous.

You have had a response to your copying here of that abstract. It would not be reasonable of you to post it without being in a position to comment in detail on the methods used, so to echo Kieran, please tell us what controls were used and tell about the statistical methods. The abstract gives no basis on which to form an opinion.

I do hope that your opinion of that study is not based solely on the abstract that really would be inept. Just to be clear, I shall give you another binary question: have you read the full paper for that abstract? Yes or No?

[Pipirr]

Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.

Inhibition of Chemically Induced Carcinogenesis by Drugs Used in Homeopathic Medicine

Full text is freely available, here:

http://www.apocp.org/cancer_download/Volume8_No1/Kuttan%2098-102.pdf

[kieran]

Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2007 Jan-Mar;8(1):98-102.

Inhibition of Chemically Induced Carcinogenesis by Drugs Used in Homeopathic Medicine

Full text is freely available, here:

http://www.apocp.org/cancer_download/Volume8_No1/Kuttan%2098-102.pdf

Excellent - a constructive step ... apparently controls were used, and quantitative results were included. Why have we had to wade through the dross to get to here?

The spread of surviving animals between a conventional medicine, pure ethanol and various homoeopathic ethanols was only 11 to 13 (out of 15) in these tests. Other indicators used showed more pronounced benefits for the homoeopathic remedies - but I'll wait until I hear from more qualified people here to see what those indicators mean in reality and how reliable they are normally considered.

Has anyone attempted replication of these results?

Do we, at last, have something interesting to discuss? :eye-poppi

[fls]

Excellent - a constructive step ... apparently controls were used, and quantitative results were included. Why have we had to wade through the dross to get to here?

The spread of surviving animals between a conventional medicine, pure ethanol and various homoeopathic ethanols was only 11 to 13 (out of 15) in these tests. Other indicators used showed more pronounced benefits for the homoeopathic remedies - but I'll wait until I hear from more qualified people here to see what those indicators mean in reality and how reliable they are normally considered.

Has anyone attempted replication of these results?

Do we, at last, have something interesting to discuss? :eye-poppi

Comparisons were not made with the relevant controls. It was not blinded. Relevant outcomes showed no difference. Irrelevant outcomes (the relationship between liver enzymes and cancer is less straightforward than they intimated (increase or decrease can be associated with both improvement or worsening)) showed some differences, but at some point you have to wonder how much data mining was going on. The lack of blinding alone makes these results invalid.

The answer to your last question is "no".

Linda

[manioberoi]

Excellent - a constructive step ... apparently controls were used, and quantitative results were included. Why have we had to wade through the dross to get to here?

The spread of surviving animals between a conventional medicine, pure ethanol and various homoeopathic ethanols was only 11 to 13 (out of 15) in these tests. Other indicators used showed more pronounced benefits for the homoeopathic remedies - but I'll wait until I hear from more qualified people here to see what those indicators mean in reality and how reliable they are normally considered.

Has anyone attempted replication of these results?

Do we, at last, have something interesting to discuss? :eye-poppi
Thanks for the reference. It is a plausible foundation study for further research. However:

In this study a mention is made of Pathak et al 2003 using Ruta 6C.

In order to avoid homeopathic aggravation and get more reproducible results, use of 6C water potency ( and RO water as control) has been discussed earlier.

The basis for this lies in the works of Hahnemann, Francisco Xavier Eizayaga, MD, Robin Murphy, ND and some French homeopaths;6C water potency is both a balancing potency and a cumulative potency - that is, it avoids grave aggravation, indicates when to stop, and effectiveness of remedy is cumulative by means of repetition.

The results here are fairly good even though use of potencies of 1M and 200C was made - ordinarily 30C has been used traditionally in homeopathic studies of the recent past - I feel there is need to change to 6C water potency. (presently vast majority of Indian homeopaths are using 10M, 1M, 200C which is quite likely to - and often does cause severe aggravation.

[manioberoi]

Comparisons were not made with the relevant controls. It was not blinded. Relevant outcomes showed no difference. Irrelevant outcomes (the relationship between liver enzymes and cancer is less straightforward than they intimated (increase or decrease can be associated with both improvement or worsening)) showed some differences, but at some point you have to wonder how much data mining was going on. The lack of blinding alone makes these results invalid.

The answer to your last question is "no".

Linda
Your fetish for chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies(placebo), double blinding / controls & c is all very well for conventional drug treatment efficacy - however homeopathy does not operate on the principles of conventional drugs.

For a detailed understanding of these issues read:
http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/nel046v1.pdf

The observations in this paper should be kept in mind while attempting to evolve an acceptable frame of reference for homeopathic trials; suitable modifications could be made in the traditional mode of drug trials to incorporate the issues raised in this paper.

[manioberoi]

That's not even an attempt to answer the question. The question remains;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

Please cease your evasions they are deeply discourteous.

You have had a response to your copying here of that abstract. It would not be reasonable of you to post it without being in a position to comment in detail on the methods used, so to echo Kieran, please tell us what controls were used and tell about the statistical methods. The abstract gives no basis on which to form an opinion.

I do hope that your opinion of that study is not based solely on the abstract that really would be inept. Just to be clear, I shall give you another binary question: have you read the full paper for that abstract? Yes or No?
I am sorry for the delay, it was unintentional.
I hope #734 #737 and #738 have resolved the issue?

[Mojo]

manioberoi, would you like to comment on the serious side-effects of a homoeopathic treatment mentioned here (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2723348#post2723348)?

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

I am sorry for the delay, it was unintentional.
I hope #734 #737 and #738 have resolved the issue?

No, they have not in any way resolved this issue.

Please select one of the two options presented;

Which do you want to admit, either homeopathy is scientifically testable or your entire clincal case record must be ignored? There is no third option. Which do you want to choose?

[MRC_Hans]

Your fetish for chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies(placebo), double blinding / controls & c is all very well for conventional drug treatment efficacy - however homeopathy does not operate on the principles of conventional drugs.

WHAAAT? We're back to square one, and now you are being condescending? OK, we can do it that way....

Maioberoi, YOU are the one with a fetish. And your fetich is clinging to the illusion that just because homeopathy has another (alleged) mode of action, then it is magically untestable.

You don't have to keep telling us that homeopathy does not operate on the principles of conventional drugs, because we already know that.

I'd like to slightly rephrase BSM's question (in order to make it VERY clear and simple):

1) Do you claim that homeopathic treatment can make an observable difference for the patient?

2) Do you claim that homeopathic treatment can NOT make an observable difference for the patient?

Now, no diversions, no nonsense, no hand-waving. Answer the question, do you choose #1 or #2?


Hans

[MRC_Hans]

*snip*;6C water potency is both a balancing potency and a cumulative potency - that is, it avoids grave aggravation, indicates when to stop, and effectiveness of remedy is cumulative by means of repetition.

The results here are fairly good even though use of potencies of 1M and 200C was made - ordinarily 30C has been used traditionally in homeopathic studies of the recent past - I feel there is need to change to 6C water potency. (presently vast majority of Indian homeopaths are using 10M, 1M, 200C which is quite likely to - and often does cause severe aggravation.Could you do us a favor and stop wasting the time of all of us by posting nonsense like this.

We know you believe homeopathic remedies do all these things, but there is no need to fill us in on the details of your superstition. Concentrate on evidence.

Hans

[kieran]

manioberoi - and to think I was giving you the benefit of the doubt in post #720 ...

I think his level of "incoherency", whilst somewhat oscillitary, is tending downwards. He appears to have (for the moment) given up trying to claim that homoeopathy is untestable, and I am hoping that that it is slowly sinking in that his cut'n'paste anecdotes are irrelevant.

How does your new stance ...

Your fetish for chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies(placebo), double blinding / controls & c is all very well for conventional drug treatment efficacy - however homeopathy does not operate on the principles of conventional drugs.

... fit in with your previous position (post #520) ...

As regards the rtial krazyKemist(498), kieran (507) and Hans (509) have suggested the basis for what I feel may be a highly workable plan of action for a homeopathic double blind trial.

... :confused:

You really do just make it up as you go along ... don't you? :rolleyes: Your mind appears to be a vacuum into which random thoughts occasionally wander. Maybe you should consider the value of these thoughts before sharing them with anyone. (See my avatar for an illustration.) You have no interest in knowledge, only excuses. :covereyes

Ask yourself - what are you afraid of here? ;)

If you can't answer the question in post #742 - then you are pointless and pathetic. I'll repeat that question here because I don't see any point in anyone else chipping in on this thread until you have answered it ...


I'd like to slightly rephrase BSM's question (in order to make it VERY clear and simple):

1) Do you claim that homeopathic treatment can make an observable difference for the patient?

2) Do you claim that homeopathic treatment can NOT make an observable difference for the patient?

Now, no diversions, no nonsense, no hand-waving. Answer the question, do you choose #1 or #2?
Hans

[steenkh]

How does your new stance ...



... fit in with your previous position (post #520) ...
I can tell you what happened: he woke up and realised that there is no scientific evidence that homoeopathy works, and that it is unlikely that such evidence will ever show up. Instead of drawing the conclusion that homoeopathy does not work, he defaulted to excuse number one and claims that tests that for magical reasons homoeopathy only works when it is not being tested.

[fls]

Your fetish for chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies(placebo),

The use of a control does not require any chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies or of the control.

The use of a control does not require any chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies or of the control.

double blinding / controls & c is all very well for conventional drug treatment efficacy - however homeopathy does not operate on the principles of conventional drugs.

The use of double-blinding and controls is completely unrelated to the principles on which the treatment operates. Double-blinding and controls are solely used to address issues of chance and bias - characteristics of the experimenter, not of the treatment.

Double-blinding and controls have no effect on the principles by which the treatment operates.

For a detailed understanding of these issues read:
http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/nel046v1.pdf

The article does not support your contention that the use of controls require physical/chemical tests.

The article does not support your contention that blinding disrupts the principles under which homeopathy works.

The article does point out that randomization and blinding may disrupt the trust within the relationship (an issue that is also present with conventional drugs). This criticism would be completely irrelevant to the cited study.

The observations in this paper should be kept in mind while attempting to evolve an acceptable frame of reference for homeopathic trials; suitable modifications could be made in the traditional mode of drug trials to incorporate the issues raised in this paper.

Yes. All of which have nothing to do with the issues you raised. Also, you previously held the opposite viewpoint when you (without any suggestion of reluctance) proposed a double-blind, controlled trial as an acceptable test of homeopathy.

Linda

[manioberoi]

manioberoi - and to think I was giving you the benefit of the doubt in post #720 ...



How does your new stance ...



... fit in with your previous position (post #520) ...



... :confused:

You really do just make it up as you go along ... don't you? :rolleyes: Your mind appears to be a vacuum into which random thoughts occasionally wander. Maybe you should consider the value of these thoughts before sharing them with anyone. (See my avatar for an illustration.) You have no interest in knowledge, only excuses. :covereyes

Ask yourself - what are you afraid of here? ;)

If you can't answer the question in post #742 - then you are pointless and pathetic. I'll repeat that question here because I don't see any point in anyone else chipping in on this thread until you have answered it ...


#1 of course!

[manioberoi]

The use of a control does not require any chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies or of the control.

The use of a control does not require any chemical/physical tests of the homeopathic remedies or of the control.



The use of double-blinding and controls is completely unrelated to the principles on which the treatment operates. Double-blinding and controls are solely used to address issues of chance and bias - characteristics of the experimenter, not of the treatment.

Double-blinding and controls have no effect on the principles by which the treatment operates.



The article does not support your contention that the use of controls require physical/chemical tests.

The article does not support your contention that blinding disrupts the principles under which homeopathy works.

The article does point out that randomization and blinding may disrupt the trust within the relationship (an issue that is also present with conventional drugs). This criticism would be completely irrelevant to the cited study.



Yes. All of which have nothing to do with the issues you raised. Also, you previously held the opposite viewpoint when you (without any suggestion of reluctance) proposed a double-blind, controlled trial as an acceptable test of homeopathy.

Linda
There is no inconsistency.
I said keep in mind the observations in the study ref to in #738- I did not altogether rule out double blinding - only if the double blinding hampers the second or subsequent remedy selection would this become an issue.

[manioberoi]

manioberoi, would you like to comment on the serious side-effects of a homoeopathic treatment mentioned here (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?postid=2723348#post2723348)?
Surely you can not be blaming homeopathy for an act of God?

[Chris Haynes]

Surely you can not be blaming homeopathy for an act of God?

Can you be specific as to which "god" you are referring to, and give evidence that it was this "god" versus the homeopathic treatment that caused the problems?