To ask whether or not people here believe in homeopathy - at the risk of floggin a dead horse...

[MistyB]

Winter: Homeopaths are not unqualified - they follow 3 or 4 year degree courses including anatomy and physiology.

Alistron1: The principle of Homeopathy has been known since the time of Hippocrates from Greece, the founder of medicine, around 450 BC.

I am tempted to answer the bottles falling on the floor question but feel that you would ridicule the answer in the way that the Spanish Inquisition determined that the theory that "the sun was imobile and at the centre of the universe" was "foolish and absurd".

i don't think it's something that's been studied much, found it interesting when i read about it though.

(yes, it was in bad science)

Homeapaths are just charlatans fleecing the gullible.

I'm a peads nurse and believe me many of the meds and treatments we used were based on anecdotal evidence and medical hypothesis but not actually medically proven. I still carry them out because I know they work.

On the other hand my husband used to spend a fortune on anti-histamines during early spring and still could barely go outside, but he saw a homeopath started a course of remedies which cost way less than a season worth of anti-histamines and hayfever relieving drugs and was able to enjoy spring with the rest of us. Now that's a pretty good case of mind over matter according to you lovely ladies, and you might be interested to know that medical trials have started on these very remedies my husband used and last I'd heard they were showing results.

Ok as you were.

Whoops - should read "Homeopaths etc"

Stata: why are you telling me that homeopathy doesn't work above a placebo effect?

I think it's fascinating to hear about oncologists using homeopathy and consultants approving it. I had a GP who prescribed it, on the Continent: it's not uncommon there.

The human body is an amazing and puzzling thing. Homeopathy taps into something impressive: the anecdotes alone are enough to make you want to give it a go. It's impossible to say that homeopathy only works by making people feel better. It's not just symptom perception (if that's what you mean?) There is real change. I think it's astonishing.

Sadly I just can't believe it's anything more than placebo, but I do think it oughtn't to be ridiculed.

indeed, the placebo effect is cool, but bugger all to do with Homeopathic preparations containing nothing that could possibly have an effect, despite being labelled with impressive ingredient names.

sorry, don't want to get sidetracked into placebo stuff again.

working again today gooseberry so still not found any good solid stuff yet.

It sounds like this very study. The patients were told: this is a placebo which has made people better in previous studies. So you had the inculcation of belief, and you had the piggy-backing on the deception of other studies.

On the other thread it seemed that people just wanted the deception taken out of the private sector and given to the state. On the other hand they didn't like state money going to the National Homeopathic Hospital.

Maybe it was different people thinking those things, because they did seem very contradictory.

Well -- that's how homeopathy works, so, if you're talking about homeopathy, you're talking about placebo.

I think it's jolly valuable just on this count.

I think MistyB is incredibly well-informed and cogent and I'm actually going to steam off because I do keep going on an on about placebo but I think I'm going to read all her arguments in favour of homeopathy working by a different method instead.

I think it will be interesting.

Homeopathy vs actual medicine is not about private vs state.

it's about all these sugar pills being sold to people who don't realise they contain no sulphur or whatever.

I do absolutely think the claims of like curing like and increasing dilution to be ridiculous. Homeopathy does though highlight the importance of a holistic approach to medicine and taking the time to talk with patients which should be done more in conventional medicine.

I had a GP who used to prescribe my daughter antibiotics like they were candies even when she just had a virus. So what? Just because a doctor does it doesn't mean that it works.

The people my mother 'spiritually heals' have reported an improvement in their health. Why not invest in my mother to go around hospitals spiritually healing patients? You'd probably get about the same return as investing in homeopathy.

what percent of Homeopathic 'remedies' or treatments do you imagine are sold to people on that basis? I'd bet that very few practitioners admit that they're selling the sugar pills.

For heaven's sake, does it matter how it works? If somebody takes it and gets better or feels better then it's fine by me.

I do not know how it works but have seen and heard of some great results including children and animals (and no, I'm not a homeopath so have no axe to grind here). There are also suggestions that many allopathic remedies work largely by placebo effect too so who cares?

As long as people use homeopathy as complementary rather than alternative, why worry?

There is a huge issue with deception, and the promotion of mumbo jumbo as 'science' sanctioned by the NHS is unacceptable.

Therefore we should not continue with homeopathy on the NHS or in pharmacies, but if sugar pills as 'placebo medicine' do prove to have a beneficial effect, this should become part of NHS treatment options.

I had a cat that was so petrified of life in general that it lived its whole life under the kitchen cupboards. On recommendation by the vet (when taking it for routine vaccinations, caught by two people wearing gardening gloves) we mixed a homeopathic remedy in its food. Within a remarkably short time, it emerged ever more frequently and actually became very assertive with the other cats and friendly annoyingly demanding with people. It was a Cat Of Very Low Intelligence, so that can't have been a factor, and I can't see that love and trust in its human providers was a factor.

Because it didn't.

it liked the sugar? you were watching it more closely and expected a change? thanks for the little story, but it doesnt contribute anything to the discussion.

Placebo use in therapeutic medicine is controversial. It requires an element of deceit, undermines the doctor-patient relationship, could have negative impacts upon the patient's well-being when/if discovered, could lead to an illness which requires genuine medicine being disregarded etc. Even with its benefits, I think that administering a placebo without prior informed consent is unethical although others may disagree.

Misty,

Could you please provide your summary of the papers that you linked to which are in German? I'm afraid I don't speak German.

Oooh, nasty! I actually think it does, or I wouldn't have mentioned it.

I am always surprised how eager people are to disprove others' stories or rubbish their beliefs. What's wrong with saying, 'Oh, how interesting, but it's not my experience.'?

goose - An open mind. You have restored my faith in humanity!

Sorry I have popped back.

I think there is a problem the nay-sayers have. It's impossible to deny the benefits of homeopathy, however come by. The naysayers say it's only placebo, and deplore the deception therein. But placebo and the benefits of it come by deception. So unless you want to remove the very valuable and measurable benefits of placebo from the health chain altogether, you are reduced to simply decrying it. You can't move on from that.

You either don't want the deception, or you don't want it in the state sector -- well what then?

Homeopathy has a good place. It's open about the fact at least that any active ingredient is diluted to a vanishing or negligible amount. It's in the private sector, largely, and the homeopathic hospital is staffed by people who know a medical condition that needs conventional treatment when they see it.

Hey Misty. You are up against it again but you seem to have the energy for it. Go for it

and wot serpent just said

This report that I linked to earlier talks about why placebos are unethical.

www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/45/45.pdf

Misty - be grateful if you could address some of the points raised in it.

Such as

" In our view, the systematic reviews and meta-analyses conclusively demonstrate that homeopathic products perform no better than placebos. The Government shares our interpretation of the evidence. We asked the Minister, Mike O?Brien, whether the Government had any credible evidence that homeopathy works beyond the placebo effect and he responded: ?the straight answer is no"

" We regret that advocates of homeopathy, including in their submissions to our inquiry, choose to rely on, and promulgate, selective approaches to the treatment of the evidence base as this risks confusing or misleading the public, the media and policymaker"

" There has been enough testing of homeopathy and plenty of evidence showing that it is not efficacious."

"There is a risk that a patient whose symptoms improve following homeopathic treatment (because of a placebo effect or because the symptom would have diminished unaided) may delay seeking proper medical diagnosis for future symptoms that may or may not be for a serious underlying condition."

" We conclude that the principle of like-cures-like is theoretically weak. It fails to provide a credible physiological mode of action for homeopathic products. We note that this is the settled view of medical science. We consider the notion that ultra-dilutions can maintain an imprint of substances previously dissolved in them to be scientifically implausible. "

"the promotion of mumbo jumbo as 'science' sanctioned by the NHS is unacceptable."

No need to be childish. But a lot of people find it very acceptable indeed. Medically trained people too.

This has probably been mentioned up thread, but I thought I'd just point out the importance of double blind trials to all the people mentioning animal homeopathy as "proof" that it really does work.

The placebo effect also affects the practitioner. If this was not the case then we wouldn't need double blind trials (the double refers to the fact that neither the patient nor the health professional knows which is the control group).

It has been proved time and time again that when the health professional knows who is in the control group, this affects the outcome. Not because of any deception on behalf of the health professionals, but because their expectations about the outcome can't help but influence what they think they see, and make subtle differences in the way they treat people.

So the fact that the patient is an animal proves nothing. The person administering the "drug" is still a person.