A seventeen-year-old girl had suffered from chronic eczema for years. The family physician had predicted relief with the establishment of the menstrual function but it got worse instead of better. Medorrhinum 200th was prescribed on an unusually clear remedy picture and with excellent results. The eruption disappeared entirely within six weeks. Improvement in the general health level was remarked by all. The remedy held all summer and fall until early in January and then the eczema began to return. The symptoms again called for Medorrhinum and the remedy was repeated.
The reaction this time was much less dramatic and the eruption failed to clear. The 1000th potency was equally disappointing. The health was good but the eruption refused to budge. A review of the case resulted in the selection of Psorinum which was prescribed in the 30th potency. After a mild aggravation, the eczema began slowly to recede. By the middle of August, at the time of the patients nineteenth birthday, there was every reason for encouragement. Two weeks later the picture changed abruptly and the eruption came back with a bang. A dermatologist was consulted by the family and took charge of the case.
Two years later the young lady and her father stopped in the office to show us that the dermatologist had done for her– not a blemish on the skin, every evidence of good health and no relapses in the two-year period. The far the remarked that the experience had taught him a good lesson, a specialist should have been consulted in the first place, for “after all,” he said, “every man to his trade.” After hating the father and the dermatologist, we finally decided to call the latter on the phone and take a chance of learning something.
The doctor was most cordial and said that he made it a rule to prohibit the use of chocolate in all forms in all cases of chronic skin eruption. Unless the patient promised at the first interview to discontinue chocolate absolutely and without exception, he would not be willing to take charge of the case. He secured this promise from our former patient. “Otherwise the treatment was purely symptomatic,” he said, “an occasional laxative or vitamin or an aspirin if necessary, a little skin oil to be used sparingly on any particularly irritated area but no regular medication”.
In looking over our record on this case, we noted what we had failed to observe before. The worst aggravation had always corresponded with some holiday season or a birthday which of course spelled candy and plenty of it, probably mostly chocolate. This concentrated, irritating and highly acid-forming sweet was evidently the chief offender, the outstanding allergy in the entire case.
This experience has paid off many times over in our results in chronic skin lesions, particularly eczema in young individuals. It all comes back to Hahnemanns priceless advice, the physician “is at the same time a preserved of health when he knows the causes that disturb health, that produce and maintain disease, and when he knows how to remove them from healthy persons”.
The following appeared in Pageant, May 1951, page 146, “Most Americans are malnourished to some degree because excess sugar consumption crowds essential foods out of the diet. Sugar provides about 18percent of the calories in the average diet. It should supply no more than 10 percent.” But it is not just sugar; excesses of all kinds, dietetic or otherwise, are bound to crowd something worthwhile out of ones life.
There are innumerable factors complicating chronic prescribing and these in many instances interfere with the action of the homoeopathic remedy to an extent that our therapeutic results are dragged down to the level of mediocrity. Consider for a moment of almost countless number of substances of a chemical nature which are being consumed by the public with a degree of faith that is truly amazing. The emotional appeal in advertising is paying off in hundreds of millions of dollars and at an ever increasing ratio every year.
Some of these drugs are causing disease, others are helping to complicate and perpetuate various diseases and still others are most certainly antidoting, to some extent at least, the action of the most carefully selected remedy. Moreover, the mere presence of these drug substances in the system helps to cloud and obscure the symptoms of the patient, thereby confusing the physician in his analysis of the case.
A graduate nurse presented such a clear picture of Asafoetida that we anticipated pleasure in prescribing the remedy for her. However, an inquiry into the matter of previous medication revealed the fact that for the past several months she had been taking Asafoetida tablets with considerable regularity. Suspecting that it was a proving, the drug was discontinued and placebo given in its place. The symptoms subsided promptly. Later, simple dietary correction overcame the flatulence which had caused her to resort to self-medication.
The case illustrated above was easy but it would not have been had we not inquired as to previous medication, nor might it have been so easy if the patient had been taking multiple vitamins plus other medicinal junk.
Some will say that the exactly correct remedy can overcome all medicinal interference, that the process of potentization puts the drug on an entirely different plane of action where crude drug substances cannot touch it. This we are prepared to admit with reservations. The prolonged use of mineral oil has produced many a case of mucous colitis. Would anyone advise its continuance while attempting to cure the patient? No to insist upon the total discontinuance of all possible obstacles to recovery is to court failure in homoeopathic prescribing.
One of the unanswered questions in homoeopathic practice is why it so often happens that the very first prescription in a chronic case acts in a manner far superior to any repetition or change of potency of the same remedy and is apparently more effective than any other remedy that may later become indicated. In the eczema case detailed above we may find a hint as to the possible answer.
The cause, or at least one of the causes of the disorder, was allowed to continue in operation after the remedy was given. May this not have resulted in a tolerance build-up to homoeopathic remedial action, thereby weakening the reactive response of the organism? If this is true, then it becomes supremely important to stop disease causation before attempting to prescribe for the patient, a large order if there ever was one.
Not only should all previously used drugs be discontinued before giving the remedy but all dietary excesses and apparent deficiencies should be investigated and corrected when discovered. A woman of sixty used an amazing amount of salt and had been doing so for years. She was thin, nervous and suffered from gastric hyperacidity. There was also much burning after urination. She was given placebo and placed on a salt free diet. In a months time the digestion had improved, the irritation from the urine had cleared and a gain of three pounds in weight was noted, the first weight increase for many years.
This was another case of a partial drug proving, although the symptom totality of Natrum muriaticum was far from complete. Months later the symptoms of Phosphorus emerged and cleared up the balance of the case. This was one of the few cases where patient cooperation was almost 100 percent. The result of the treatment proved gratifying to both patient and physician.
Coming now to emotional factors in chronic cases, the trend recently has been to stress and often overstress emotional maladjustments.
All directional trends have a tendency to swing too far and this one is no exception. After all one cannot fire the boss, either at home or at the office, nor should the physician feel called upon to find a parking place for the mother-in-law so that the young folks may live happily ever after. Life has to be lived and often of necessity the old, the sick and the helpless must be included within the family circle. If an adjustment to circumstances cannot be made, the individual is either suffering from an impairment of health or from emotional immaturity.
Philosophy has shown us that the even is of far less importance than ones reaction to the event. It is the reaction that is symptomatic of the individuals mental and physical health. Sound psychiatric advice may help one to make proper adjustments, but let us not forget the power of the completely similar remedy in achieving the same and often a more lasting result. Homoeopathy enables people to live at peace with others more than anything else yet discovered in the line of therapy.
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA.
DR. ALLAN SUTHERLAND [Brattleboro, Vt.]: This is a very interesting paper in many aspects. I often wonder if it would not be advisable and helpful in these many cases of eczema which we homoeopaths see to have all of them skin-tested for possible allergy. I am doing that myself more and more, and I find that the information obtained is extremely useful, and I might say not only in eczema but also in other chronic states.
Eugene passed away at his country home on Spring Hill, Tuscarora Township, Bradford County, PA. He had been in ill health for several months. His wife, the former Caroline Davis, whom he had married in Philadelphia in 1910, had passed away in 1961. They spent most of their marriage lives in Swarthmore, PA.
Dr. Underhill was a member of the United Lodge of Theosophy, a member of the Philadelphia County Medical Society, and the Pennsylvania Medical Society. He was also the editor of the Homœopathic Recorder.