Homeopathy in Organic Livestock Production

Glen Dupree, DVM

Written for both organic farmers and homeopaths, this book is a comprehensive and indispensiable guide for the application of homeopathy on sustainable livestock farms.
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Treating Acute Disease PDF  | Print |  E-mail
As defined in Homeopathic terms, an acute disease is one imposed on the patient from an outside source and is not dependent on the inherent susceptibilities of the patient.  An acute disease can be from trauma (physical or emotional), poisoning, or overwhelming epidemic contagion in which the pathogen is so virulent it overcomes all or most individual resistance in the exposed population.

Since acute disease is externally imposed and is not due to the inherent susceptibilities of the patient, and since acute disease is self-limiting (the body will recover without treatment unless the symptoms are severe enough to result in the death of the patient), the treatment of acute disease is much more forgiving than the treatment of chronic disease.  In this is the latitude to use nearly any treatment modality since an acute disease is not part of the intrinsic dynamics of the health of the patient.

Any therapy which will shorten the course of an acute disease and ease the suffering of the patient may be acceptable.  Treatment of most acute diseases will remove the disease or will allow it to run its course with less discomfort to the patient, but will not change the long term dynamics of the patient’s health.

If you chose to treat acute disease (and in some cases acute exacerbations of chronic disease) with Homeopathy, you may enlist the services of a trained Homeopath or you may use the more cookbook methods found in most Homeopathic emergency and first aid manuals.  A good emergency manual and a 30c emergency remedy kit can be used to lessen the sufferings of the patient and may in some cases be life savers.

Choose the remedy that seems best suited to the acute disease (suited to the event or crisis, not necessarily to the patient as a whole).  Dose and repeat the remedy at 1-30 minute (or longer) intervals depending on the severity of the symptoms.  It may take 3-5 doses before a response is seen.  

Your dosing schedule should approximate the dynamics of the crisis – fulminate and life threatening symptoms may need to be dosed at 1 minute intervals or less, slower and less severe symptoms will require longer dosing intervals.  Tailor the schedule to the situation, not to some preconceived formula.

Stop dosing once a response is seen.  Use single dose repeats thereafter as this response begins to wane, repeating the dose only as necessary to maintain the continued improvement of the patient.

If no change is seen in the patient in 3-5 doses, change to the remedy that seemed to be next most appropriate to the acute disease and repeat the above process.  If you have not seen an appropriate response after your first selection has been repeated 3-5 times, then the remedy was not correct for the situation.  Don’t let ego get in the way – change remedies if your first option was not correct.

In emergency situations the potency selection is not as important as is the remedy selection.  Initially dose with the potency that is closest at hand and refine your potency selection as the crisis eases.

You will also need to observe for changes in the symptom picture of the patient and change remedies as necessitated by these changes.  You should only use a single remedy at a time but the particular remedy used may change as the nature of the crisis changes.

In treating acute disease, you will probably need to dose quicker and may change remedies faster than in the treatment of chronic disease.  

This treatment scheme may also be used with acute exacerbations of chronic disease to get the patient out of crisis.  In this situation, however, you must be aware that you are actually treating chronic disease.  Once the crisis is resolved, you will need to address the overall chronic disease of the patient to change their tendency to have these crises.

Study the common emergency situations for the types of animals for which you are responsible and get to know the remedies indicated for these situations.  Having a familiarity with the remedies before a crisis can be a life saver.