Therapeutics of diphtheritis : a compilation and critical review of the German and American homoeopathic literature / by F. Gust. Oehme.

  • Oehme, F. G. (Ferdinand Gustav), 1826-
Date:
1876
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Therapeutics of diphtheritis : a compilation and critical review of the German and American homoeopathic literature / by F. Gust. Oehme. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    1. The internal treatment—Although diphtheritis appears as varied as many other diseases, yet most physicians have entirely neglected to individualize. Many have chosen some one particular remedy, administered it in all cases without distinction, and jus- tified themselves by their success. If their success has been so satisfactory with one remedy for all cases, it would have been much better still, if they had individualized and used various medicines, just as they would have done in the treatment of any other disease. Nature nor homoeopathy has made an exception in diphtheritis. The evil effects of this one-remedy doctoring is seen in the quality of our Therapeia on diphtheritis, which is very inferior to that of any other disease in the whole homoeopathic literature. The gen- eral remarks* are often nothing but sweeping assertions, how this or that drug cured all cases. Frequently is added, with the greatest naivete, that, notwithstanding in some instances the administration of this one remedy had to be persisted in for several days before any improvement was perceived. Now we say, that just these cases should have been treated with some other medicine, because if a remedy is the right one it acts at once, and the recover!/ is quick. The majority of the clinical cases are insufficiently and incom- pletely described and the cures not convincing. We do not wish to be misunderstood; we do not demand perfection ; but when we see so generally not the least inclination to individualize and read so many worthless clinical cases it is time to reprove. The modus operandi and results of a physician in his practice is one thing, and his publications another: with the first we wish to be as lenient as possible; with the other we reserve the right to exercise a severe but just criticism. If physicians had individualized in their practice, and published only such cases wherein the influence of the medicine was quick and unquestionable,f our Therapeia on * By general remark, in contrast to clinical case, we understand the indi- cations for the selection of a.remedy, such as we find in works on therapeutics. f We cannot express too strongly our opinion on this point. We are not satisfied with cases where the operation of a drug is only probable, or nearly so. There can be no other reason for publishing a clinical case otherwise than to show the effect of a medicine ; and the writer should bear in mind that the reader does not see the case. Therefore its history should be given as completely as possible, the language concise and clear, symptoms well arranged, and, above all, the effect of the medicine so decided that there can be no shadow