HOMEOPATHY AT HOME – Everyday Treatment for Common Complaints

Posted on 22nd January 2025

Homeopathy at Home – Everyday Treatments for Common Complaints is a new book written by Marcus Fernandez, Principal of the Centre for Homeopathic Education (CHE) in London. Marcus has been working in Homeopathy for three decades.

The Book

The book is a practical and simple-to-use guide for those interested in using homeopathy to help with typical health condition that affect us all. It retails at under £15. The book describes simply the homeopathic approach and gives guidance on simple prescribing methods.

Buy a Kit

Later, in this blog I will cover Marcus’s top 10 remedy list. However, ideally you need to have a small remedy kit as mentioned in my earlier blogs on first aid. Both Ainsworths and Helios sell these.

Whilst the pharmacies can send a remedy out in 24h, this is not much help when looking after a sick child at midnight on a Saturday (which according to some unwritten law is what always seems to happen!)

Homeopathy at Home – Principles

Let’s start 2025 by restating some basic principles. Homeopathy contrasts orthodox medicine in that it sees symptoms as the attempt of the body to reestablish harmony. What do I mean by harmony? Put simply when there is harmony – that is to say we are ‘well’ – no symptoms are apparent. Given the orchestration of trillions of cells in the human body, this is quite astonishing.

Marcus gives the example of the child who can run around all day, go to bed tired, wake up fully refreshed an run around the next day in the same manner. Boundless energy – that is a body in harmony with itself.

Sadly that state may diminish somewhat as we age, but nonetheless we go about our day pretty oblivious to our bodies and the complexities of its inner workings.

An Example – Pain

One of the most obvious signs of disharmony is pain. The orthodox approach is to manage these symptoms. The marketer’s – you surely notice – encourage us to seek out over the counter medicines like Paracetamol (Tylenol in the USA). Apparently some 35 tonnes per annum of Paracetamol is used per million of the population in the UK. Nice little earner!

Paracetamol is effective of course, but only at the level of suppression of symptoms. It is not curative. Much the same can be said of many prescribed drugs also.

In the end it is the body itself the does most of the healing.

The Supportive Role of Homeopathy

This is where Homeopathy comes in. Homeopathic medicines are not drugs in the conventional sense, they are ultra dilutions and their purpose is to stimulate the innate healing potential that we all have.

Homeopathy at Home – Prescribing

Prescribing homeopathically is not quite as simple as picking up a box of Paracetamol. Nor can you say you take X for Y, though as Marcus’s book shows there are for first aid purposed typically four to six remedies that have particular affinity to each common complaint.

Prescribing homeopathically is governed by the law of similars, meaning that the symptom picture of the patient should match the ‘picture’ of the remedy.

A child (and it typically is a child) with a sudden high fever might be given Belladonna, because the Belladonna picture has high fever of a particular type. The characteristics of an Aconite or Gelsemium fever is different. Thus each remedy has its keynotes – and much of Marcus’s book is about keynote prescribing.

To help identify these keynotes he uses a nmenonic CLAMS.

• C is concomitants – symptoms that accompany the main concern e.g. diarrhoea and a headache
• L is location – what parts of the body are affected
• A is aetiology – a fancy word for cause
• M is modalities – what make the symptoms better or worse e.g. must move or cannot move
• S is sensation – e.g. stabbing pain or burning pain

Another approach is to draw a circle and divide it into four quadrants. Two quadrants are for aetiology (cause) and modalities as above, another is for affinity (= location) and the last covers symptoms (a combination of C and S in the CLAMS method).

Either way the aim is to get as full a picture as possible about what is going on.

Homeopathy at Home – Top 10

Marcus has a top 10 remedy list – here are some example keynotes:

• Aconite – sudden onset, hot, restless, apprehensive, fever – remedy for inflammations during the first 24 hours
• Apis – red, hot, burning and swollen. Think of the characteristics of a bee sting. Useful for bites and stings but also cystitis
• Arnica – Deep bruising and shock – yet the victim makes light of their suffering
• Arsenicum – chilly, restless, thinks it useless to take medicine, thirsty for sips of warm water, eyes and nose stream and burn, great weakness, better for heat, No 1 for sickenss and diarrhoea
• Belladonna – similar to Aconite but slightly slower onset, high fever – yet chilly – wants to be covered, red skin, glaring eyes – even delirium and rage (contrasts Aconite)
• Gelsemium – classic ‘flu: chills up and down spine, feeling tired, weak and shaky, not too thirsty, headache (picture of ‘dull’, ‘droopy’ and ‘drowsy’).
• Hepar Sulph – infections with pus: abscesses and boils, ear and throat infections, styes
• Hypericum – nerve damage: crushed fingers, tooth pain after dentistry work
• Rhus tox – aching in the bones, teasing cough at night, restless = better with motion, possible septic state (muscles stiff but better once moving).
• Nux Vomica – history of mental strain and excessive use of stimulants (coffee etc.); chilly and irritable / contrary with fiery temperament, must be covered, cough with bursting headache, dry fever without thirst, gastric symptoms (keynote: crampy, hypersensitive, cold intolerant)

If you wish more guidance, or to explore the potential benefits of Homeopathic treatment, please book a discovery call via my website or mail me at [email protected] and I will respond by return