Hypertension 1996 : One Medicine, Two Cultures
Homeopathy for hypertensive treatment
W. Fabbro
Surgeon specialized in Urology - Italy
The development of the circulatory tree
in superior animals brought about problems of “flow direction” (from arteries
to veins) and of pressure regulation within, in the light of the different
possible kinds of damage it is exposed to.
To this end vessels have been provided with sensors able to perceive pressure
changes, baroceptors, chemoceptors, renal renin/angiotensin/aldosterone
system, in order to interpret them, to forward them to bulbar regulation
nervous centres and from these to the heart and vessels through the parasympathetic
and sympathetic pathways. Indeed, since arterial pressure results from the
heart output multiplied by vascular resistance, its maintenance at physiological
values under normal conditions results from a compensation of both parameters.
The term arterial hypertension defines a clinical condition in which pressure
values at rest are higher compared to values that are conventionally accepted
as normal: 120 mmHg for systolic pressure and 80 mmHg for diastolic pressure.
If the pressure limit of 140/90 mmHg is exceeded, the death risk due to
vascular complications progressively increases compared to the normotensive
population, especially affecting the heart, the brain, the kidneys, and
the eyes: these parameters therefore also constitute a reference in order
to issue an anti-hypertensive drug treatment.
Arterial hypertension, affecting up to 20% of the adult population in industrialized
countries, has a known origin in only 8 to 10% of cases (secondary hypertension),
while in all other cases a drug treatment, often to be continued indefinitely,
is prescribed with the sole aim of removing the consequences of the symptoms
which normally precede, and ultimately appear as a steady pressure increase
(basic hypertension).
Therapy selection is in fact linked to the physician's personal concept
of disease: within the framework of allopathic medicine, such concept is
still too often affected by the Cartesian severance of mind and body. In
this respect, the symptom is not meant as the expression of a disease and,
as such, as a beneficial sign to be interpreted in order to highlight its
cause, but is rather immediately perceived as a synonym for the disease
itself. Although underestimated in Biology and Medicine, the idea of the
mind controlling the body is the most important concept we have about life
processes.
Thus, issuing a long-term symptomatic treatment in patients with increased
pressure values, especially if moderate and not clearly resulting from organic
causes, may often encourage the onset of a chronic pathological process.
On the other hand, a functional disease may be specifically considered as
the human body's inability to preserve or recover its homeostatic condition.
Within this etiopathogenic approach, issuing
a treatment means providing specific stimulation to encourage restoration
of the body's normal physiology: this is the aim of energy or “message”
therapies, among which homeopathy is particularly important.
The homeopathic approach to hypertensive patients is therefore focused on
the individual as a whole.
The correctness of such approach, however, is supported by modern physiology
and psychosomatic medicine, which have exhaustively confirmed the correspondence
between physical and emotional levels: this correlation is also highlighted
by EEG and biofeedback studies which, for example, demonstrated that deep
mental concentration or meditation may result into an increased brain blood
flow, at the same time causing a relaxation of striated muscles and reduced
arterial pressure values.
Any physical, emotional, or mental stimulation therefore exerts a corresponding
effect at all body levels, something, which occurs instantly and simultaneously.
Clinically, the clearest types of correspondence establish a relationship
between the function of some organs and specific emotional conditions: melancholy,
for example, seems to be associated with liver disorders, anxiety with ulcerative
colitis, and excitability with peptic ulcers.
The holistic approach adopted by homeopathy, based on the “law of the alike”
and on the use of low or infinitesimal doses, allows to come up, through
a careful analytical process focussing on individual somatopsychic conditions,
with a global diagnostic-therapeutic summary taking into account the very
lasting unity of the ill individual, thus preventing the common mind-body
dichotomy.
Thus “the hypertensive patient is treated” rather than employing standard
drugs against hypertension.
A deep knowledge of both the patient and the events that could have contributed
significantly to the onset of a specific disease is required to identify
the appropriate homeopathic remedy.
Therefore, after carefully assessing and ranking symptoms, acknowledging
the priority of mental and behavioural ones, a nosographic diagnosis may
be attempted while biopathologically and diathetically defining the patient
considered.
This allows to select the “simillium” remedy, that is the substance which,
if administered in weight-related doses, would cause the highlighted symptoms
in healthy patients while, if administered in a diluted and dynamized form,
due to the law of the alike, may treat them.
Thus administration of the Nux Vomica remedy in hot-tempered, nervous patients,
intolerant to even any slight contradictions, abusing alcohol and/or smoking,
suffering from insomnia, constipation, dyspepsia and headaches, will restore
the body's balance even before the possible onset of arterial hypertension.
On the other hand, patients reporting recurrent hepatalgia especially after
meals, with meteorism and flatulence, a weight loss with no clear cause
combined with hair loss and prone to infections and diapyesis especially
in the respiratory tract, hypercholesteraemia, hyperuricaemia, along with
authoritative behaviours especially at work, in spite of persistent asthenia,
will draw clear benefits from the intake of Lycopodium.
The diagnosis of the patient, rather than of his/her disease, allows preventing
development of functional imbalance towards an overt and persisting organic
disease; homeopathic medicine thus also plays a crucial role in prevention.
In order to prevent the clear organic damage following up a constant increase
in pressure values, if such condition has already been reported, homeopathy
may also be consistently and positively supported by other similar treatments.
For example, in order to achieve a draining effect on emunctory systems,
especially the urinary and respiratory tracts, the use of plant-derived
methods may be considered, sometimes associated with organotherapy.
But particularly a change in the patient's feeding pattern may be crucial.
In the nutritional field too, the homeopathic approach prevents the need
to issue severely pre-established diet schemes, and rather focuses on the
patient's re-education so that he/she may finally learn how to eat correctly
and, at the same time, according to his/her own taste and requirements,
rather than according to regulatory principles that are alien from his/her
feelings and wishes.
Once again the aim is to restore the human body's self-regulation skills:
in non-pathological conditions, the body is able to regulate and adjust,
for example, body temperature at optimal levels, both through inner mechanisms
and by making the individual conscious of any changes, so that he/she may
take the appropriate steps. The mechanisms regulating the need to rest or
sleep, ventilation, heart output or rate, and so forth work in a similar
manner: if the issuing of the holistic therapy influences hypertension by
acting on all regulation systems as a whole, this also applies to hunger,
thirst and appetite.
The existence of specific nervous centres dedicated to the regulation of
such functions suggests that will is only necessary to obtain what is required
to satisfy them.
In all cases, appropriate remedies should best be combined with the supply
of basic information allowing the patient to correctly decoy and interpret
his/her feelings, and possibly separate them from those that result from
educational, information and socio-cultural distortions, so that he/she
may then accordingly adopt appropriate behaviours.
When the suggestions provided match in turn with the patient's personality,
educating to physical or mental relax, to correct exercise and feeding patterns,
and so forth is a very quick and effective process, since it is simply a
matter of activating instinctive behaviours which sometimes have been suppressed
for a long time.
The possible outcome of this approach is not only limited to the disappearance
of pathological signs, but involves in most cases achieving a total and
on-going physical well-being.
Bibliography
- Bellavite P., Signorini A., Fondamenti teorici e sperimentali della Medicina Omeopatica, Nuova IPSA ed., Palermo, 1992.
- Colombo L., Martinelli 0, Cuore vasi ipertensione, Il pensiero scientifico ed. Roma 1992.
- Hanemann S., Omoepatia Organon dell'arte del guarire, Edium, Milano, 1975.
- Hodiamont G, Trattato di farmacologia omeopatica, Vol 2 IPSA ed. Palermo, 1994
- Vithoulkas G., La scienza dell'Omeopatia, Cortina ed., Verona, 1986.
Edited by Aldo Campana,