Tuesday 28 August 2012

HOMEOPATHIC SEMINARS - Is screening necessary?

After many years I decided to attend a seminar in Kolhapur, conducted by a reknowned Homeopath of Pune. He is reputed to have a 80 bedded hospital where-in (supposedly) all types of emergencies are handled. The publicity given, led me to believe that he treats cases admitted in the ICU on ventilator. I bit the bait.

I was curious to know how a Homeopath runs an ICU without the help of sophisticated life-saving equipment, I.V. fluids and Oxygen none of which he is trained to handle, leave alone legally possess. As the video presentation began it was evident that the cases he claims to have treated were in fact treated surreptitiously, in other hospitals, without the knowledge of the hospital staff, management or faculty. There is no evidence that the allopathic drugs were discontinued or modified to allow the administration or action of the Homeopathic remedies. The condition which the patients were suffering from (as we were told), in all probability involved the use of steroids as part of the treatment. Do homeopathic drugs act when steroids have disabled the immune system? No pathological reports, other than a photocopy of the hospital case-sheet were displayed to buttress the clinical diagnosis of the conditions under treatment- like Pompe's disease, Guillain Barre syndrome etc.

There are many questions which arise from this seminar. Is it ethical to treat a case in a hospital without the knowledge and consent of the treating physician? In the event of death of such a patient what liability does the Homeopath accept? Is he not vicariously responsible for any mishap, should it occur? If this practice is being followed, will the kind doctor release a statistical study of all the cases (of any and all conditions) he has treated in this fashion regardless of the outcome of  his treatment?

Every case presented certainly showed the recovery of the patient from the comatose condition he was in, but what about the pathological condition which the patient was supposedly suffering from, for which the good doctor claimed a cure? No follow-up reports or investigations were displayed which proved that the disease/condition was reversed! To top it all, the good doctor attempted to explain Type II Diabetes Mellitus as "a condition caused by deficient Insulin in the circulation due to destruction of the Beta cells of the pancreas"!!

The irony was that this seminar was organised under the aegis of several Principals of Homeopathic colleges from Maharashtra and Karnataka. It is my fervent plea to all heads of institutions to kindly screen the speakers of all such seminars along with the matter to be presented. We can ill afford to train our students in such dismal fashion and expose them to destructive or disabling law suits.

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