CAN HOMOEOPATHY HELP IN TREATING SOME CANCERS?

Cancer is a disease which has a fear factor attached to it. The reason for the fear is the mystery attached to the disease, that is, nobody knows why it happens and also we don’t know when and how it will strike whom. All we can do is take precautions if there is a family history of cancer and keep a check, but that is all, we still cannot prevent it with surety.

Homoeopathy has a role in cancer which needs to be defined more precisely. As far as benign growth is concerned, homeopathy can work very well in cancer treatment. The growth regresses, however, is a gradual process. In case of malignant growths, the spread is faster and life-threatening. In such cases homoeopathy has a different role in different stages of the disease. 

Generally people approach a homeopath in the later stages of the disease. Homoeopathy has a wide role in the post surgery phase. Some people come after chemotherapy and radiotherapy for cancer treatment or for management of the side- effects of these therapies and recovery of the patient from this stage. Homoeopathic cancer treatment has tremendous scope in tackling the side-effects of chemotherapy and radiotherapy which should not be restricted to specific drugs but should be helped with symptomatic presentation of case and by constitutional remedies. We also get patients that are in advanced or terminal stages, referred for pain relief, especially due to bone metastasis in such cases significant relief can be achieved by administration of medicines in low triturations.

As homoeopathy has a holistic approach towards treating any disease, therefore if we get a thorough case history of a patient which includes their physical, psychological and all other relevant information then the patient can be treated more effectively. In few cases mental history plays a very important role in selecting a similimum. In many patients it is found that there is a history of conflict at the psychological level wherein the person is compelled to do some form of a task physically or mentally which he internally does not wish to do. This is manifested physically in the form of irregular division of cells. Such cases fall in psychosomatic class of diseases. Remedy selected on this basis usually lead to treat patients.

A quote from “The Scope Of Homoeopathy” chapter of Dr Stuart Close’s book “The Genius of Homoeopathy” aptly applies here – “The gross, tangible lesions and products in which disease ultimate are not primary object of homoeopathic prescription. We do not prescribe for the tumors which affect the patient, nor are we guided by the secondary symptoms which arise from the mere physical presence of the tumor: we prescribe for the patient-selecting and being guided by the symptoms which represent the morbid, vital process which preceded, accompanied and ultimate in development of tumor.”