The problem of disease

90

THE

BRITISH

ItOIVI(EOI~ATHIC JOURNAL

never be able to take a w a y our power to do good for all those who trust us with their health and their lives. After all, these are, in this world, the two most precious possessions of our patients in the eyes both of their loved ones and themselves. H a h n e m a n n wrote in 1819, " I t is now high time t h a t . . . physicians should at length cease . . mere talk, and begin now, instead, for one to act, t h a t is really to help and to c u r e . " H e considered it necessary to repeat this admonition in every subsequent edition o f the Organon. I t appears to be quite as necessary now: am, Sirs, Yours sincerely, J. :FRASER KERR.

ThE PROBLEM OF DISEASE To the Editors. S l a s , - - A s I am a recent convert to the A r t of Homceopathy, as yet only an Associate, I feel I m a y be able to contribute a small share to the unravelling of the problem of w h y it is t h a t H o m c e o p a t h y is not more widely known. I have in m y reading of the JOURHAL noticed t h a t it is always creeping inl chiefly in the forms of H o w is it t h a t even the Allopath knows so,little about it ? or W h y h a v e n ' t our cures put H o m c e 0 p a t h y quite definitely on the m a p ? The reason Why I take this presumptuous attitude is t h a t until quite recently I w a s myself an Allopath. As a student, during the whole of m y five years a t hospital I never once heard H o m c e o p a t h y discussed in any form. E v e n more incredible is the fact t h a t although we paid our periodic visits t o Queen's Square for examinational purposes I never heard anyone ask w h a t is the L o n d o n Homceopathic Hospital over there. Since leaving the ranks of m y Altopathie friends, quite naturally t h e y h a v e asked me w h a t I a m doing, and when I say t h a t I am studying for m y Homceopathic Membership t h e y are surprised to hear t h a t there is such a thing, and I have yet to meet someone who knows t h a t there is a Homceopathic Hospital in L o n d o n and where it is. The main reason for this state of affairs is, I think, due to the fact t h a t the syllabus is so crowded these days t h a t we ofily get w h a t I call a technical training. We have no time to read the historical side of medicine, and still more there is a shocking lack of intermingling between the various hospitals and various schools of thought. We definitely jeopardized our chances of hospital appointments if we wandered outside our own habitation. To give a more vivid picture I will quote two of m y own experiences. As I had come all the w a y from South Africa to partake of what the British Isles could offer me, I was. naturally keen to see other institutions and hear the " big noises " lecture, especially the editors of m y text books. I n this venture I found great a p a t h y amongst the English students, who seemed quite content within their own boundaries; thus I had difficulty finding a colleague to a c c o m p a n y me to the open lectures at the R o y a l College of Surgeons and I remember t h a t when an Honol:ary asked where Lister's statue was, let alone a n y t h i n g a b o u t H a h n e m a n n . only one of us knew out of a gathering o f about fifty. Similarly I had great difficulty in doing a short course at another hospital because the professor concerned took it as a slight against his own d e p a r t m e n t and I had thus to go over his head to obtain permission f r o m one who appreciated the advice of travel as widely as possible before y o u tie yourself to general practice. You will most likely recall y o u r own student days all too vividly in agreement when I say t h a t I think our teaching certainly in these days is too

CORRESPONDENCE

91

technical. We seem to be providing for little men with great technical skill and not for the great masters of the Art. Let alone having time to read about Hahnemann, which I have since done, I still have to read the views of Hippocrates, Celsus, ParS; Sydenham, Semmelweiss and Virehow to name but a few. Is it any wonder, then, that we as medical students know nothing outside our own hospital ? What's more, it doesn't pay, nor have we the time to read outside what is absolutely necessary for our examinations. I feel the remedy here lies in educational films, n o t the technical ones and the custom of monthly or quarterly visiting lecturers, as there seems little hope of altering the curriculum in this direction. An interesting sidelight here is t h e fact that my father also had five years as his allotted period of study, and yet he did not have to contend with biochemistry, radiology and elec$rocardiography, to mention but a few of the larger additions. Likewise I do battle with the same question in its other form as presented by my non-medical friends when they ask how it is that if Homceopathy is such an excellent system of materia mediea, to say but the least, that it is not more widely known and practised. I feel there are two main reasons for this. The minor is that even the homceopath is but h u m a n , i.e. he is always fighting laziness ; no wonder he falls to the temptation of trying to take short cuts, which is relatively more fatal to the practice of good Homceopathy than the rule-of-thumb methods. I t is a difficult Art, and being so it needs time, care and patience, things that are noticeable by their absence in the twentieth century. Therefore when one combines the ill effects Of a quick turn over Of patients with lazy repertorizing, our figures are not as convincing as they might be. The major reason for our failure to be impressive is, I think, because of our lack of appreciation of the problem before us. Our materia medicas are on the whole quite good ; what is far behind them is our understanding of the diseased patient. As a beginner I feel this very strongly. I f only I knew my patient-disease picture as well as m y drug picture things would be much easier and the results better, I think. Rightly or wrongly, I find that m y pathology fails me and the symptom-sign picture is not enough. How often has one worked out the exact matching to have it fail you, yet in casting around one comes across another drug t h a t touches the hidden spring. Even with all the data of the now completed case, one still cannot fathom out how all this occurred. Having carefully eliminated one's personal thoroughness and the completeness of the materia medica used, the only answer left is that the knowledge of the disease is still lacking. I feel we want as revolutionary a conception of disease as was Hahnemann's of drug therapy. Most of our mistakes, our difficulties and the lack of a generally high and consistent average of results lies, I think, in our lack of insight into what is going on,. over and above how the patient appears. I find that I have more than enough data about the drugs but little or nothing bar the ordinary physiology and pathology about the patient-disease complex, and that is why I find the Art so difficul~ and my results so haphazard. I.n conclusion, I would like to add that I have always been a physician because I feel that surgery other than traumatic surgery is an admittance of a lack of the necessary knowledge to effect a cure. As an Al!opathic physician I was SOsickened by the negative attitude of leave things alone and all will be well, not to mention the lack of logic behind the treatment that was given, that I would have given up medicine altogether other than the branches Of midwifery, dietetics or hygiene, had I not been forced by my despondency to look around and to have found Homeeopathy. l~ow that I am delving into this Art I often wonder how often we merely prune the symptoms admittedly less crudely than the surgeons but nevertheless leaving the roots or root untouched because of our lack of knowledge--no, not lack o f knowledge, but because of our inadequate Allopathic conception of

92

THE

BI~ITISH

I~OM(EOPATHIC

JOURI~AL

the k n o w n facts, for I feel t h a t we know our tools as well as the surgeon knows his i n s t r u m e n t s , b u t t h a t n e i t h e r of us knows w h a t is b e h i n d what we are working or c u t t i n g on. After all, our p a t i e n t in his or her e n t i r e t y is b u t a s y m p t o m of w h a t lies behind, i n t h e same w a y t h a t something lies behind the p r o d u c t i o n of t h e mass of cells we call a neoplasm. J u s t as we physicians tell the surgeon we are fighting the intangible force t h a t affects the nuclei of the cells he cuts, so I feel " Mother N a t u r e " could say to us t h a t we do n o t deal a d e q u a t e l y with t h a t super-nuclear force t h a t affects the p a t i e n t as a whole. Does it mislead us even i n its t o t a l i t y when presenting as a sick person with all its peculiarities ? I t h i n k it does. While I realize t h a t this letter is n o t v e r y constructive or helpful, yet I would appreciate a n y advice, as I feel it should be the aim of the y o u n g homceop a t h to investigate the disease problem as H a h n e m a n n did the drugs. Too m a n y who followed h i m have spent too m u c h t i m e on the m a t e r i a medica a n d too little u p o n the disease a n d its multiple presentations. Yours sincerely, J: O. PEARSON.

NOTICE

TO

CONTRIBUTORS

AND

CORRESPONDENTS

Editorial communications should be addressed to Dr. W. Lees Templeton, 146 I:[arley Street, W.l, or to Dr. John Paterson, 12 Royal Terrace, Glasgow, C.3. The Council have decided to invite the submission of articles. By special arrangement with the editors, authors may receive payment for such articles specially written for the Journal. All matters relating to advertisements should be addressed to Mr. L. J. Knowles, at the London Homceopathic Hospital, Great Ormond Street, W.C.I, and all other eommunieatioms to the publishers, Headley Brothers, ]09 Kingsway, London, W.C.2, from whom the Journal can be obtained. Secretary of the Faculty of Homceopathy, Miss ]Yiartin, London Homceopathic Hospital, W.C.I."

INDEX

TO A D V E R T I S E R S PAGE

British Homceopath~c Association, 43 Russell Square,.London, W.C.1 iv Carr's of Carlisle - viii, ix Denver Chemical Manufacturing Co., 12 Carlisle Road, London, N.W.9 Cover iv Ehrhart & Karl, 143 l~orth Wabash Avenue, Chicago, Ill., 'U.S.A. ii Epps, Thatcher & Co., 60 J e r m y n Street, London, S.W.1 ii ttomceopathic Publishing Co., 24 St. George Street, Hanover Square, W. 1 Cover iv Keene & Ashwell Ltd., 38 I%w Cavendish Street, Londou, W.] i London I-Iomoeopathic IL1ospital iii, iv, x and Cover ii National Provincial Bank Ltd. vii Nelson & Co. Ltd., 73 Duke Street, Grosvenor Square, London, W.1 vi l~onuk Ltd., l~ortslade, Sussex Cover ii Southalls (Birmingham) Ltd,, Charford Mills, Birmingham ii Vitalia Ltd., 11 Springfield, Upper Clapton, London, E.5 iii William H e i n e m a n n (Medical Books) Ltd., 99 Great l%ussell Street, London, W.C.] iv Wright, L a y m a n and U m n e y Ltd., 44-45 Southwark~Street, S.E.1 Cover iii