Introduction (Expert Homeopathy: Dr. Anutosh Chakraborty)
Word - meaning
"Idio" means one's own personal; "Syn" means with, along with and Krasis, crazy means makeup, constitution.
Definition
Idiosyncrasy is a unique body constitution that even if you are otherwise healthy, you have a state of being brought into a state of almost weakened by certain things that seem to bring no change to most people.
According to Stuart Close: "By idiosyncrasy, we man a habit or quality of the organism peculiar to the individual. It is a feature of the constitution, whether innate or acquired, which consists of an individual's ability to be sensitive to a particular agent or that it will not affect others".
Example
Some few persons are apt to faint from the smell of roses and to fall many other morbid, sometimes dangerous states from partaking muscles, crabs or the roe of the barbel, from touching the leaves of some kind of sumach, etc.
Discussion
Referring to the symptoms of idiosyncrasy produces by the medicines, it has been noted that -
Some symptoms are produced more frequently i.e. in many individuals.
Others more rarely or in few persons.
Some only in very few healthy bodies.
To the latter category, belong the so-called idiosyncrasies.
Drug symptoms are the manifestations of the action of the drug on the vital force and the vital force's reaction against the drug action.
So they are in all cases, the product of their action and reaction. The variability in the manifestations of symptoms depends on two factors.
The inherent power of the influencing substance.
The power of the life force that animates the body can be limited.
Though the influencing substances have the power to make the same impression on all human bodies, a small number of the healthy constitution tends to produce the obvious morbid condition. The truth is that, homeopathic service to all sick persons for morbid symptoms similar to those they seem to be only capable of producing in so-called idiosyncratic individuals.
Types
According to Dr. Kent, there may be-
- A chronic idiosyncrasy from chronic miasm
- An acute idiosyncrasy from an acute miasm.
- Idiosyncrasy may also e inherited and acquired.
Cause
"The main cause of all disorders is that the body is balanced and that it is an organic state in which an excess and deficiency in its development cause an excess and a lack of function, to the same degree of arousal or irritation."
Origin of idiosyncrasy
Both inherited and acquired types of the perverted constitutional get-up are the results of various factors. But the major causes are:
- Previous abuse of drugs to which morbid susceptibility still exists.
- Suppression of disease condition - both mental and physical.
Example:
Many people who are poisoned by medication react to this medication for a condition that is known as anaphylaxis. A similar example is a susceptibility to Rhys poisoning of those who have once been poisoned, especially if their initial attack was treated tropically by external remedies. Such persons are poisoned by the slightest contact with the plant or even bypassing in its vicinity without contact. In such cases, the disappearance of the original external manifestations of the disease is followed by the setting up a constitutional susceptibility which renders them peculiarly vulnerable, not only to the particular drug concern but to the disease to which the drug corresponds homeopathically. They are illustrations of metastasis, which is regarded by some as being due to suppression of the primary form of the disease by injudicious or palliative treatment. This view is based on direct observation and is sustained by analogy with the well-known serious results of the accidental or incidental disappeared or repercussion of external symptoms in the acute eruptive disease, such as measles and scarlet fever.
Where the initial attack is perfectly cured homeopathically by internal medicines, such results never follow.
Studies show that some cases of inherited traits and drug sensitivities can be tracked for abuse of these resources by the child's parents or ancestors.
Therapeutic utility:
a) Throughout millions of persons only one person is affected by such minor things, but when used as medicine this substance will cure each and every person suffering from similar symptoms.
Example
Princes Maria Porphyroghnita restored her brother the Emperor Alexius, who suffered from a faint by sprinkling him with rose water in presence of his aunt Eudoxia. (footnote to sec. 117/1 )
Horatius saw great benefit from rose vinegar in cases of syncope.
b) Due to idiosyncrasies, since from them we come to know the medicinal virtues of even apparently non-medicinal substances and thus it can be employed judiciously and rationally for the betterment of the suffering humanity.
c) From the standpoint of homeopathic prescribing, it is often the key to a difficult case. These peculiarities take on a certain degree of importance as indications for a remedy. It expresses and represents a peculiarity of the patient himself - of the case as a whole. They aid in individualizing the case and help to differentiate between two or more similar remedies. Thus in a certain puzzling case the symptoms 'aggravation from onion' discovered only after the case had baffled for several weeks, leads to the selection of Thuja, which cures the case.
Treatment of Idiosyncrasy
a) According to J.H Allen, "Patients suffering from idiosyncrasy can not be said to be healthy human beings. They need anti-miasmatic treatment, they need the similia that in their particular case removes or separates psora, or the tubercular element or whatever may lie behind the idiosyncrasy".
b) A very high potency of the drug to which the person is idiosyncratic will sometimes remove that susceptibility. A dose of Rhus Tox. c.m. will open check the acute poisoning from Rhus.
c) But if the patient has been born with a sensitivity to Rhus tox, while Rhus may palliate a few times, it will finally cease to help him. When one is born with this sensitivity, it is very tenacious and will sometimes persist, despite our best endeavor, to the end of life. If eradicated at all, it requires an antipsoric treatment.
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