Is it a con or can it help my sick child?

[Nightswimminginoldpants]

Homeopathy?

Feeling a bit vulnerable at the moment, so not sure if it’s clouding my view.

Dd is ill and I’m getting desperate. Have been talking to a homeopathist online, she is very intent that homeopathy will help my Dd get better.

Does it work?

OP.. I'm no expert... and apologies if you've already tried this, but I have found with various family ailments/conditions over the years that there are often charities which deal with coping with symptoms and new research and they can be a really useful resource.

There is a Pans/pandas UK association which might be a useful starting point.. maybe they have an up to date opinion... which your GP might not have details of. Or could suggest a medical professional who could give some advice on a variety of things that could help the symptoms.

How did your child get better?

Sorry to hear that your child is ill. Please don't waste money on homeopathy. It does not work. Its claimed mode of action has absolutely no scientific basis whatsoever.

Regular Antibiotics, steroids and anti-inflammatories. We still have flares and always will as it’s relapse remitting auto immune condition, but between flares she is 95% the child she was before developing PANDAs

It’s a con. I’m sorry about your DD.

Homeopathy doesn’t work. It’s a nonsense.

However, the placebo effect is well understood and recognised. Injections of water work more than water given orally as pretend medicine. Water administered by people in white coats has a stronger effect than administration by people in normal clothes. That is the effect of homeopathy; placebo. If you believe it, it could have some effect. Or even on others: ‘here’s extra medicine from mummy, it will make you feel better, now don’t you feel better?’ That is why there is in some places a very limited offer on NHS. On me it categorically wouldn’t.

You don’t say how old your DD is. If she believes the nonsense then it maybe could help. But be careful, she could then also feel obliged to lie to you to make you feel better about the illness, to reassure you she feels better and maybe mask symptoms, worsening symptoms, pretend, and that could be dangerous. You should be careful about projecting your anxieties about your daughter onto her, that is not fair on her on top of the burden of illness.

Of course the homeopath would say it would help, wouldn’t they? How much money will you be paying them? It’s unethical, but one approach is to treat your DD secretly then she isn’t burdened reporting benefits to you. I bet the homeopath wouldn’t be happy about that though!

Can I also just say, I am a huge fan of acupuncture. Tons of solid robust clinical evidence for its effectiveness. And it works in animals. (So rules out placebo, if it has a clinical observable benefit on a creature without ‘consciousness’ in the way humans have). So it isn’t that I am suspicious of all complementary therapies, just the bollocks and placebo which is all homeopathy offers.

Homeopathy used to be available on the NHS, the king uses it and the Queen carried remedies in her purse.
Ive used it and still do for bumps and bruises, fevers etc, my son has used it for hayfever and my daughter when she was younger for worms. I think it does work. But you have to avoid mint and coffee if you have a prescribed homeopathic remedy as it can interfere. Also recommend naturedockids / Lucinda Miller on Instagram - she has a great blog and you can also message her for advice

I'm so sorry your child is ill.

I have no skin in the homeopathy game whatsoever, but I saw a documentary a long time ago where a completely sceptical farmer was persuaded to try homeopathy on his ailing cows. They put the stuff in the water trough and the cows immediately showed significant improvement.
It wasn't a woo-based programme, more like Tomorrow's World or something.
It stuck with me as the cows' recovery was so swift.

Just added this for some balance

There's a reason it's no longer available on the NHS. Lack of proven efficacy.

I'm unaware of the King or Queens' scientific or medical credentials.

Our Dr will not prescribe steroids

@SirRaymondClench would you care to provide any decent references (peer reviewed by real clinicians, in a decent clinical academic journal) supporting your assertion that ‘statins don’t do anything’?! Asking on behalf of a national health service I know which is benefitting from statin medical treatment to hugely reduce CVD risks, but if that isn’t the case and other interventions work better or more cost effectively, there are a LOT of global medical directors who’d love to know what you know 🤣🤪

WHO:. https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/cardiovascular-diseases-(cvds)

BHF: https://www.bhf.org.uk/what-we-do/our-research/research-successes/statins-save-lives

And NHS pages has loads of good info. Adding these in case anyone thinks this PP might have a point. They truly don’t.

Wow, you've linked to a film that you need to pay to watch. Thus proving the point that exponents of homeopathy are money grabbing charlatans.

I’m sorry, they have helped to seal the blood/brain barrier. Have they said why they won’t prescribe them?

'magically effective' is an apt description. Magic isn't real either, nor is it magic!

Not true. Some has been clinically proven to work.above the placebo effect.

Homeopathy has been clinically proven to have absolutely no effectiveness above the placebo effect.

Some herbal medicine if used correctly can have clinical benefits (Senna for constipation, Valerian for sleep).

Acupuncture is recommended by NICE for several conditions (eg chronic pain, migraine).

From contact with many other parents in the same situation, it seems it’s rare to be prescribed steroids. What was your child’s underlying illness? Which Dr did you go with please? Its very difficult to get help

One programme (did it have scientific principles ? Has the experiment been reproduced in a controlled environment? Is the data published somewhere?) is hardly 'balance' for the complete lack of any evidence elsewhere.

Homeopathy cannot work. Any effect is the placebo effect which can be very powerful and is scientificly real. New medicines have to prove to be at least 20% more effective than placebo. Herbal medicines can also be effective if they include true herbal active ingredients. Many conventional medicines are derived from plant compounds.

I do, yes.

'Practicioners' believe that substances that cause an illness can also cure it if that substance is hugely diluted (often to the point of there being literally no remaining molecules of that substance remaining in what is left).

Part of that belief was that this must be done following a ritualistic process of shaking and diluting, though I wouldn't be surprised if modern day adherents play down or move away from that more clearly bonkers pillar of Hahnemann's as they start to try to play up a more 'scientific'-sounding respectability.

You're right, though, I had quite forgotten that homeopaths (one suspects for similar reasons) have also progressed to proving their 'remedies' in the form of sugar pills containing a drop of the diluted substance (water. At a push another solvent - be careful with that one.)

So I suppose theoretically they might also assist someone with low blood sugar too, but jelly babies are much more effective.

Re steroids the lady I mentioned on IG’s daughter was given steroids. This was under the care of Dr Tim Ubhi (London).

if you didn’t see my post she is @parenting_pandas (Lucy) she is very helpful and has a lot of info on her account. I seem to remember steroids did help (and homeopathy in fact)

Ok. I’m going to pop my head above the water and (tentatively) say that I’ve been using homeopathy for years and really do champion the benefits of it.

There is a nuance to all of this that I often find doesn’t exist in the conversation which is why I rarely discuss homeopathy with anyone outside of my family. I openly and happily use conventional medicine, and yes if I broke my leg, I would go to hospital and let medical experts sort it out. I would then use homeopathy afterwards to help with the healing. I never discount conventional medicine but that does not mean that things like homeopathy cannot be used alongside it.

Now I’ve said my bit, I do not see any harm in using a homeopath for your child’s diagnosis. I would be wary of anyone who says that they can “cure” autism, but you would (in my opinion) be doing no harm exploring this avenue and seeing if it helped your DC. I’m happy to speak more about it but I’m always cautious of doing so as the people/posters who do not believe in homeopathy are quick to shout down and sometimes get quite aggressive.

It’s because it doesn’t make any money for big pharma that’s why

Homeopathy is very, very tiny amounts of something in water. The theory is that the water magnifies the power of the substance in it. Does that sound logical to you?

Why does mint and coffee interfere?

Others on this thread have said that homeopathy is cheaper than big pharma med (I don't know if this is true or not). If it is, why would the NHS not be funding it? I would save them a fortune.