Homeopathy & thousands

observational studies

This brief post is formed from comments on an earlier post Homeopathy, Cochineal, and Carmine - a case of coughing¹ regarding long term, large cohort, chronic disease outcomes and homeopathy studies (if you have more please drop them in the comments.)

‘‘The EPI3’’ study followed 6000 patients of 804 general practices in France for the conditions of: musculoskeletal; sleep; anxiety disorders; and Upper Respiratory Tract Infection (URTI). Homeopathy prescribing preference met specific patient needs with less use of conventional medicines and without an apparent loss in therapeutic opportunity.²

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‘‘Homeopathy in the public health system: a seven-year observational study at Lucca Hospital (Italy)’’ Rossi et al., 2009³ followed 3700+ visits. Homeopathic therapy is associated with improvement in a range of chronic and recurring pathologies. Certain characteristics of patient and pathology influence the outcome.

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‘‘How healthy are chronically ill patients after eight years of homeopathic treatment?--Results from a long term observational study’’ Witt et al., 2008⁴ followed 3500 adults & children. Patients who seek homeopathic treatment are likely to improve considerably. These effects persist for as long as 8 years.

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‘‘Homeopathic treatment for chronic disease: a 6-year, university-hospital outpatient observational study’’ Spence et al., 2005⁵ followed 6500 outpatients. Homeopathic intervention offered positive health changes to a substantial proportion of a large cohort of patients with a wide range of chronic diseases.

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Also, there are many published, peer reviewed case studies in homeopathy which document an individual’s progress over many years - for example, Chabanov et al., followed a case of juvenile rheumatoid arthritis for 18 years.⁶ And, I have a published a case study of a child followed for four years.⁷

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‘In contrast to frequent claims, the available MAs of homoeopathy in placebo-controlled randomised trials for any indication show significant positive effects beyond placebo. Compared to other medical interventions, the quality of evidence for efficacy of homoeopathy was similar or higher than for 90% of interventions across medicine.⁸ Accordingly, the efficacy evidence from placebo-controlled randomised trials provides no justification for regulatory or political actions against homoeopathy in health-care systems.’⁹

Aude sapere!

1. Homeopathy, Cochineal, & Carmine

2. Moride Y. 2022. Methodological Considerations in the Assessment of Effectiveness of Homeopathic Care: A Critical Review of the EPI3 Study. Homeopathy. May;111(2):147-151. Available from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34521145/

3. Rossi E, Endrizzi C, Panozzo MA, Bianchi A, Da Frè M. 2009. Homeopathy in the public health system: a seven-year observational study at Lucca Hospital (Italy). Homeopathy. Jul;98(3):142-8. Available from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19647207/

4. Witt CM, Lüdtke R, Mengler N, Willich SN. 2008. How healthy are chronically ill patients after eight years of homeopathic treatment? Results from a long term observational study. BMC Public Health [online]. Dec 17;8:413. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2630323/

5. Spence DS, Thompson EA, Barron SJ. 2005. Homeopathic treatment for chronic disease: a 6-year, university-hospital outpatient observational study. J Altern Complement Med. Oct;11(5):793-8. Available from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16296912/

6. Chabanov D, Tsintzas D, Vithoulkas G. 2018. Levels of Health Theory With the Example of a Case of Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis. Journal of Evidenced Based Integrative Medicine. Jan-Dec;23:2515690X18777995. Available from: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/2515690X18777995?url_ver=Z39.88-2003&rfr_id=ori%3Arid%3Acrossref.org&rfr_dat=cr_pub++0pubmed&

7. Homeopathy & Recurrent Pneumonia...

8. Howick et al., 2022. Most healthcare interventions tested in Cochrane Reviews are not effective according to high quality evidence: a systematic review and meta-analysis. J Clin Epidemiol. Aug;148:160-169. Available from: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35447356/

9. Hamre et al., 2023. Efficacy of homoeopathic treatment: Systematic review of meta-analyses of randomised placebo-controlled homoeopathy trials for any indication. Systematic Rev. 2023 Oct 7;12(1):191. Available from: https://systematicreviewsjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13643-023-02313-2#Abs1