Homeopathy in the Philippines

Poverty shapes life in the small village at the foot of Mt. Mayon, an active volcano in the Philippines. Fortunately, an Australian has set up a charity there to help the people in this remote area. They live in primitive conditions with open fires for cooking, pit latrines and water pumps for daily use.

The founder of the charity is one of my patients here in Australia, who has himself experienced the effects of homeopathy. He asked me to go there and treat the people, and I have just returned from my sixth trip within a year.

I want to illustrate the simplicity of the case histories and the speed of healing with the following cases. I believe that treating people in third-world countries is like a journey back to the times of the old masters, when there were fewer obstacles to healing.

CASE 1

JoJo lost his brother two weeks ago. He died of tuberculosis (TB). His mother had already died of tuberculosis when he was a teenager. The young man is extremely underweight, has loss of appetite and high fever with night sweats. Yellow-green phlegm is difficult to expectorate. He has stomach pain, greenish diarrhoea and vomits phlegm in the mornings.

I initially treated him with Ignatia 1M and Arsenicum album C 30 dilution to take if his breathing became severely laboured, and asked him to come back the next day. He did not, so we went to his home the following day.

When we arrived late in the morning he was too weak to come to me – only a 2-minute walk. By then the morning amount of phlegm had decreased; he now had an unproductive, dry cough and only produced some sputum in the mornings. His appetite had improved after the fever subsided, and his breathing was now better. He still could not sleep and had bouts of sweating and diarrhoea. However, he began to feel better. I gave him Tuberculinum C 30 and he continued to take Arsenicum album C 30 dilution as needed.

The next morning he brought his X-rays. The finding was active TB, pneumonia and calcification of the lungs. When I examined him his breathing had eased somewhat, there was no more vomiting, no more sweating or fever, and his appetite had returned.

CASE 2

Mariel is a young woman with an infected finger that is black and ulcerating. She was applying a cream that was suppressing the suppuration. I asked her to stop using the cream. She had only slight pain and only a mild itching. When she stands she experiences vertigo; the room seems to spin around her.

I gave her a few pellets of Arsenicum album C 30, as well as Calendula mother tincture to bathe the finger. Four days later there was a startling result: the ulcers that were about to develop had not progressed but had disappeared. The finger began to discharge pus, and the purple-black patches of skin receded. The dizziness vanished as if blown away.

CASE 3

Ludovico is a man in his early thirties diagnosed with diabetes. He had been advised to have his foot amputated. He told me he was born with two feet and wanted to die with two feet. He showed no signs of diabetes.

He stands in water contaminated with buffalo dung and has neither clean water nor dressing materials. Despite all the treatments he had undergone, nothing changed. His left foot was very swollen, painful and infected. He had applied local herbs that somewhat suppressed the infection but did not really heal the wound. He could only sit, as walking caused him extreme pain. He returned three days later after taking Calendula C 200 twice. We instructed him to keep the wound as moist as possible with Calendula mother tincture. He stopped using herbs; the swelling subsided and he limped around proudly and even tried to put weight on the foot.

Five weeks later he was no longer taking Calendula pellets but still soaked the foot in the mother tincture. The swelling has now gone, the wound is steadily getting smaller and the pain has greatly diminished.

CASE 4

Monica is 71 years old and had a stroke a month ago. When she came to us she had to hold onto the walls for support when walking. She is weak, dizzy and suffers from double vision. When walking she feels as if she will fall and her eyes water all the time. She has numbness in her feet, in her right arm and in both legs and constant shoulder pain. Instead of walking she can only shuffle. We tried Arnica and then Phosphorus — without success. One dose of Nux vomica C 30 cured her visual disturbances within minutes; her strength and mobility visibly improved. Only her eyes still watered. We changed the remedy and gave Conium C 30 six weeks later, which gave more strength to her arms and legs.
  Now, about four months later, her right arm is fine, the numbness in her feet is gone, and she can walk freely around the village again without limping or shuffling, and her thinking has become clearer. Her eyes still water and remain blurred; these are the only remaining symptoms. The most striking improvement is: previously she was housebound — now she has become an active member of the community again.

CASE 5

We saw Rowena for the first time on 9 October 2010. She was so weak she could hardly sit on her mother's lap. If her mother let go she would collapse to the ground. She has a hereditary disease that her sister also had, but which was cured by conventional treatment. Unfortunately Rowena did not respond to conventional treatment. It is clearly a disease of the central nervous system, as the weakness progressed until she could no longer walk or hold her head up. She can lift her arm to indicate a "high five" and she can lift her head a little, but it keeps falling back onto her chest.

I gave her Phosphorus C 30 dilution to take weekly for six weeks until I returned; Phosphorus also suited her lively, happy nature. I increased to Phosphorus C 200 and finally to 10 M. She can now walk a dozen steps without assistance, not very controlled, but she is strong enough to walk at all. She can walk around the house holding onto the walls, she can sit alone in a chair, hold her head up by herself, and she is beginning to eat without help. She can play on the floor with her sisters again and her whole body has become much stronger.

CASE 6

Azia is 21 years old and has a breast abscess in the right breast. She is pregnant for the second time, although the first child is only six weeks old. When she came in she held her right shoulder about 15 cm higher than the left because of the severe pain.

Every movement, even breathing, intensified the pain. The right breast was three times the size of the left and an open wound covered half the breast. The discharge was slight; only the burning wound pains tormented her. I gave her Bryonia C 30 and prepared her for the start of increased discharge that night.

Within a minute her breathing became easier and the breast began to discharge green pus that literally dripped out of the breast. She was almost immediately free of pain. If I had not seen it with my own eyes I would not have believed it. While she took Bryonia the pains eased and eventually disappeared. I told her to apply moist compresses with Calendula mother tincture to the wound as often as possible.

She came back the next day and we talked a little about her life. Her mother died when she was seven. Her father remarried and Azia said no one could ever replace her mother. I believe that was the cause of the abscess, which arose when she herself had just become a mother. Natrium muriaticum 1M completed the healing.

I wonder if we might also have reduced the scarring if we had stayed and continued the treatment.

CASE 7

Demarie, 12 years old. Her complaint is cardiomegaly (enlarged heart). There is a family history of heart problems; an aunt also suffers from this condition. Demarie constantly has a runny nose and sore throats. She faints easily from loud noises, fear or tension. When she first came she was a sullen little girl. She could not go anywhere on foot or play with her friends, because she became tired very easily. She often had to miss school because it was too much for her. With Syphilinum 1M the runny nose disappeared within minutes, her colour returned, and her breathing improved.

Four months later a radiant, cheerful child came to us, who had caught a cold after getting wet. I hardly recognised her. She no longer has heart problems and has as much energy and strength as any other child her age; she no longer faints and no longer suffers from chronic rhinitis.

Photos: Felicity Nutting

Categories: Cases

Keywords: Tuberculosis, abscess, ulceration, stroke, diabetes, poverty, weakness, cardiomegaly

Remedies: Arsenicum album, Bryonia alba, Calendula officinalis, Conium maculatum, Ignatia, Natrium muriaticum, Nux vomica, Phosphorus, Syphilinum, Tuberculinum Koch