Asthma patients use homeopathy

Many asthma patients use homeopathy and other CAM procedures

10/31/2013

Scientists from the Canadian University of British Columbia have used a population-based study to investigate whether and which treatment methods of asthma patients are used in parallel with conventional therapy. The study was published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ Open 2013; 3: e003360). In addition to homeopathy, asthmatics also use phytotherapy, acupuncture, diets and chiropractic. As a reason for the parallel application, the researchers suspect dissatisfaction among patients with conventional medicine. Women and patients with uncontrolled asthma are particularly likely to use complementary therapies, says the study. The attending physician should take this as a sign and critically review the asthma management, as the complaints from the basic therapy are not under control.

„Not what the patient has is important, but how he is doing“
He has much experience in the homeopathic treatment of asthma patients. Stephan Heinrich Nolte, specialist in pediatric and adolescent medicine from Marburg. Nolte has a homeopathic diploma training of the DZVhÄ. The specialist emphasizes in an interview in the autumn issue of the popular journal Homeopathy of the German Central Association of Homeopathic Doctors (DZVhÄ) that in the acute treatment of severe asthma bronchiolar widening drugs are indispensable and that in a severe attack sometimes high-dose cortisone must be given in the short term. „At the beginning of treatment, I reluctantly refrain from these drugs. However, the goal of homeopathic treatment is to relieve it over time as the patient gets better“, explains Nolte. Unlike conventional medicine that uses the so-called disease „Disease management programs“ (DMPs) managed, the homeopathic doctor treated not the diagnosis of asthma, but the
People with asthmatic symptoms, and considers the trigger and the circumstances of the disease. „Triggers and accompanying circumstances make the clinical picture individual.

Not the disease symptoms themselves, which are similar in all patients“, says Nolte. Worldwide, between five and ten percent of people of all ages are affected by bronchial asthma. In Germany, about five percent of adults and around ten
Percent of all children bronchial asthma. In children, the disease is thus - in Germany as well as worldwide - the most common chronic disease. (Pm)

Picture: Günther Richter