Homeopathy
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Homeopathic remedies
Homeopathy (also homœopathy or homoeopathy; from the Greek
ὅμοιος,
hómoios, "
similar" +
πάθος,
páthos, "
suffering" or "
disease") is a form of
alternative medicine first defined by
Samuel Hahnemann in the 18th century.
[1] Homeopathic practitioners contend that an ill person can be treated using a substance that can produce, in a healthy person,
symptoms similar to those of the illness. According to homeopaths,
serial dilution, with shaking between each dilution, removes the
toxic effects of the
remedy while the qualities of the substance are retained by the
diluent (water, sugar, or alcohol). The end product is often so diluted that materially it is indistinguishable from pure water, sugar or alcohol.
[2][3][4] Practitioners select treatments according to a patient consultation that explores the physical and psychological state
[5] of the patient, both of which are considered important to selecting the remedy.
[6]
Claims for efficacy of homeopathic treatment beyond the
placebo effect are unsupported by
scientific and
clinical studies.
[7][8][9][10] Meta-analyses of homeopathy, which compare the results of many studies, face difficulty in controlling for the combination of
publication bias and the fact that most of these studies suffer from serious shortcomings in their methods.
[11][12][13] Homeopathy is scientifically implausible
[14][15] and "is diametrically opposed to modern pharmaceutical knowledge."
[16] For example, the common use of remedies that are so highly diluted that they contain no molecules of the substance being diluted is in
contradiction to mainstream science's basic understanding of how nature works.
[17] The lack of convincing
scientific evidence supporting its efficacy
[18] and its reliance on remedies without molecules have caused homeopathy to be regarded as
pseudoscience,
[19] quackery,
[20][21][22] or in the words of a 1998 medical review, "placebo therapy at best and quackery at worst."
[23]
Current usage around the world varies from two percent of people in the
United Kingdom and the
United States using homeopathy in any one year,
[24][25] to 15 percent in
India, where homeopathy is now considered part of Indian
traditional medicine.
[26] Homeopathic remedies are generally considered safe, with rare exceptions;
[27][28] however, homeopaths have been criticised for putting patients at risk by advising them to avoid
conventional medicine, such as
vaccinations,
[29] anti-
malarial drugs
[30] and
antibiotics.
[31] In many countries, the laws that govern regulation and testing of conventional drugs often do not apply to homeopathic remedies.
[32]
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