1001 Small Remedies

Review

This book review is reprinted from The Homoeopath with permission from Nick Churchill of The Society of Homoeopaths.

Reviewed by Robin Logan

This book is an 'inside-out Repertory' in the form of Agrawal's Materia Medica of the Human Mind and anyone who has found that book useful will love this one. It is not exactly a Materia Medica but rather the extraction of the symptoms of 1001 remedies from the Synthesis 5 Repertory. Unlike Agrawal's book, this one is not just 'Mind' symptoms - it includes all the physicals and generals. The 150 largest remedies are presented in the form of unique symptoms only. To do otherwise would turn this single book into several volumes.

For anyone who has not used this sort of book, I can highly recommend it. Even as a computer user with the ability to do remedy extractions in a few seconds, it is very useful having the whole lot in book form on your desk. It is also an invaluable teaching tool.

The book is solidly bound and attractively presented. There is a useful index of remedy names and synonyms and a well thought of innovation of annotations indicating the number of remedies in each rubric, e.g. 'Homesickness - 51'.

All in all a lovely book that would have saved us many hours of Repertory trawling in the days before computers!

The Homoeopath No. 58 1995

 

This book review is reprinted with the permission of the International Foundation for Homeopathy

reviewed by Karl Robinson, MD

Frederik Schroyens, editor of Synthesis Repertory, has generated a second tome from the computer program "Radar version 5." This one he calls 1001 Small Remedies. "Essentially, this book is a twin of Synthesis," writes Schroyens in his foreword. "It contains the same information presented in another form. It has no pretension of being a Materia Medica, nor of a Keynote book, because it just gives crude facts."

This volume, which runs 1504 pages, contains 150 major remedies and 851 minor ones. The 150 major remedies have 50 to 100 unique symptoms presented. These are symptoms having only one remedy. For the minor or lesser known remedies Schroyens has extracted all the symptoms. This is where the book can prove invaluable. For the first time, it is possible to find all the symptoms of, say, Alumina phosphorica, in one place. Schroyens calls these "crude facts." I call them "invaluable facts." It is now certainly possible to prescribe minor remedies with greater precision using 1001 Small Remedies than it ever was before. It makes prescribing little known remedies quite a bit more feasible.

If Schroyens decides to come out with a second edition I would suggest that the 150 major remedies be dropped as they are well covered elsewhere and, for reasons of space, purposely not well covered in this volume.

RESONANCE JANUARY-FEBRUARY 1996

 

 

This book review is reprinted with the permission of the Homeopathic Academy of Naturopathic Physicians

Review: Iain Marrs


"Essentially this book is a twin of Synthesis. It contains the same information, presented in another form. It has no pretension of being a Materia Medica, nor a KeyNote book, because it just gives crude facts. All the symptoms are enumerated, without creation of themes or special emphasis. That is why it is merely a tool, which can be used by anyone." from the Foreword, 1001 Small Remedies

The above quotation is a modest description, though essentially true. However, the author's modesty should not let the reader overlook this book's usefulness. To keep the book of manageable size, Schroyens excludes (at one end) any remedies that have only one or two known symptoms; and (at the other end) includes only the unique symptoms of 150 major remedies. In the case of extremely large remedies, the set of unique symptoms is further narrowed down to select the "more refined symptoms," thus presenting little-known and often illuminating facets of ,.well-known" remedies.

For example, although Ferrum metallicum has two and a half columns of selected unique symptoms; in the Mind section, we are offered only Excitement - contradiction, from slightest. But many other symptoms stand out- such as, Epistaxis alternating with spitting of blood,or Bend arm; irresistable desire to. Meanwhile, among the smaller remedies, Ferrum phosphoricum has seventeen columns, Ferrum arsenicosum and Ferrum iodatum twelve each,Ferrum muriaticum and ferrum magneticum five each, Ferrum picricum and Ferrum sulphuricum one each, and Ferrum bromatum under half a column -- all of these being full listings of the remedy's known symptoms.

As Dr. Schroyens notes, the greatest innovation in 1001 Small Remedies is the method of presenting the symptoms. There petition of each item in the tree of rubrics (for example, 'Fear', or - 'lying') is abbreviated after the first mention (respectively, F~ and I`) - with each part of the symptom separated by a vertical line. Thus the rubrics,

Reading - agg. mental symptoms (2)
Reading - desires - medical books; to read (2)
become:
Reading agg. mental symptoms | R~ desires - medical books; to read

- which makes reading symptoms much less aggravating (and not only for Calcarea !)

If a remedy has numerous symptoms in a particular area (convulsions, in Cuprum, for example), then, in addition, symptoms are grouped in indented paragraphs wherever they have common parts.

Thus, within the section 'Generals,' Cuprum aceticum has five paragraphs of convulsion rubrics:
Convulsions 305 | C~ begin in fingers | f~ toes, and 2
Convulsions - begin in - legs | b~ toes 2
Convulsions - children, in 77 | C~ consciousness - without 66 1 C~cyanosis, with 4 | C~ dentition, during 39 | C~ epileptic 216 | e~ aura (before epileptic convulsions) - knees, in 2
Convulsions - eruptions - suppressed; from 17 | s~ break out; or when they fail to 15
Convulsions - injuries, from 18 | C~ pressure; from - stomach; on 4 |
C~ tetanic rigidity 144 | t~ trismus, with 7

This method of presentation is easier and quicker to read than the traditional method, and represents a true innovation.

As to the range of remedies included, it extends to the very little known - picking a part of the book at random, I find Formicicum acidum, Fragaria vesca, Franzensbad aqua, Fraxinus americana, Fucus vesiculosus, Fuligo ligni, Gadus morrhua, Galinsoga parviflora and Gallicum acidum, together covering three pages (sandwiched between Formica rufa and Gambogia, whose sections are each five pages long.

As an experiment, let us pick a larger remedy, say, Drosera. We find that Dr. Schroyens offers three and a half columns of unique symptoms, Mind to Generals. In the Mind section, he has selected five symptoms:

Delusions - enemy - rest; enemy allowed him no | D~ suicide; impelled to commit - drowning; by
Obstinate, headstrong - execution of plans, in
Plans - carrying out; insists on
Reading - subject, must change the

A small criticism here: of these, could not one of the 'plan' symptoms have been left out and another unique but different symptom offered instead? Looking in the Complete Materia Medica Mind - the extraction by Retzek from Roger van Zandvoort's Complete - I notice the unique symptoms 'Anguish during whooping cough,' and 'Anxiety, evening, when alone, as if he would hear unpleasant news.' This is, of course, random nitpicking and anyway does not concern the main purpose of the volume - but, it could be argued, the selection of unique symptoms might have reflected further unique facets. If this trivial point were repeated with other larger remedies, it might represent a weakness. It must be remembered, however, that for every such remedy 1001 Small Remedies then gives the other (non-mental) symptoms, where many other facets of the remedy emerge.

Looking elsewhere in this volume, the prescriber may find five and a half pages of Hura brasiliensis rubrics, Mind through Generals. To compare the Complete MM Mind (Retzek) and Schroyens's Synthesis extraction, Retzek (in three and a half pages, single column) gives 34 unique and 131 common rubrics in the Mind section for Hura brasiliensis. Schroyens gives 104 symptoms in the Mind section (one and a half columns) and 34 in the Dreams section, then ten more columns of symptoms for the rest of Hura. Clearly the strength of the Comp1ete MM Mind is its exhaustiveness, from large remedy to very small, in the Mind section. But 1O01 Small Remedies offers, for those same remedies, a listing of all rubrics - thus providing a tremendous resource for the study of all aspects of smaller remedies, as well as insights into larger remedies for which only the unique symptoms are given.

In Jayesh Shah's case of Drosera, (this issue, Simillimum), both the Complete MM Mind and 1001 Small Remedies would have supplied the rubrics for those symptoms upon which the prescription was based.

So - if the question of which book to buy arises - both are excellent and can be used well together. As Dr. Schroyens rightly says, "I hope to have selected the most interesting and unknown information about the homeopathic remedies. Therefore, this volume will be found to be complementary to any existing book."

As can be seen in the Lachesis and Salicyclic acid excerpts (published as separate chapters in this issue of Simillimum) 1001 Small Remedies is clearly laid out. The typeface is larger than the one used in Synthesis. One remedy begins where the last leaves off, leaving no blank space on a page, but - perhaps because of the innovative symptom presentation - the pages do not have a cramped feel to them. I find already that 1001 Small Remedies is invaluable, especially when a remedy unknown to me appears in a rubric - and I want to see, in the quickest and clearest format, the essentials of that remedy.

Our thanks must go to Dr. Schroyens and helpers for this volume. The twin of Synthesis has been delivered; it is dressed in blue, is weighty but not cumbersome and, as he says, without pretensions. It includes a useful innovation for printing a string of related symptoms. The rubric here is: 'Mind, Writing, talent for easier' (unique symptom ... )!

Winter 1995 Volume VIII No. 4 / SIMILLIMUM

 

This book review is reprinted with permission from Homeopathic Links.

This book has been called the "Twin of Synthesis", it contains a 1001 remedy extractions from Synthesis Repertory. Not only from the Mind (like in the above reviewed CMMM) but now through all the chapters of the repertory. Of the 150 biggest remedies only the single-remedy rubrics (sometimes only the ones in capitals or italics) are given so that Sulphur c.s. only takes one page and more space is left for the smaller ones (Hippomanes 3 pages, Lobelia inflata 4, more than 5 for Sanicula aqua). It is as if at last they get their breathing space and can unfold, without being overshadowed by their big polychrest brothers. Most of the small remedies haven't got a characteristic mental picture and the physical symptoms are the only possible ones to prescribe upon. But you can find little jewels in the Minds of those smaller ones too. Sac lac that remedy we give to our patients in "mothertincture" all the time because we don't know the potentised picture of it, can become a great remedy if we see that it has in its mental picture: -Delusion, murder, mother wants to murder her; Delusion, pieces; it would be a great relief to fall to pieces, only by great effort she kept herself together; Delusion, sea; he were tossing on a rough sea.

The lay-out has been done in such a way (by double column pages, not taking a separate line for every symptom, working with abbreviations) that all of the text space is maximised without interfering much with the readability. No source information has been given or differentiating remedies only the rubrics in plain, italic or capital font and the number of remedies in the rubric. Paperchoice made this 1500 pages only half the thickness of the 1800 pages of CMMM.

Homoeopathic Links - Autumn 1995

 

This book review is reprinted from the British Homoeopathic Journal Vol 85, Number 1, January 1996, with permission from Peter Fisher, Editor.

This is a re-statement of some of the Synthesis Repertory in a different form. As Dr Schroyens explains in his preface, the task of searching the repertory for each rubric of a given medicine used to take 12-24 hours. Students in some teaching schools were required to undertake this exercise and those who have done it have, as Dr Schroyens acknowledges, learned a good deal about the repertory in the process. No British school for medically qualified practitioners has (so far!) required the same discipline of its students. Since the advent of the computer, it is no longer necessary, save for its learning value. It is a danger of the computerized repertory that because we study it less we are less well informed of its potential.

These reflections made me wonder what we need books for. Some are for learning materia medica and some for reference, of which the repertory is the obvious leader. This book is intended to be a work of reference. Information is presented just as it leaps from the repertory's printed page: a jumble of unrelated pieces of information, hard to memorize.

It can be of value for the student to wrestle with 'extractions', as these are called; to try to make sense of them by linking related symptoms, and searching for patterns which give the medicine a theme or themes. That is a valuable learning tool. Those who possess computerized repertories can produce extractions in a matter of seconds, anyway. They have no need of this book. Also, for all I seem to have said against it, any serious homoeopath working along classical lines actually needs a computer repertory, because the difference in time it takes to do an adequate repertorization by hand and by computer is immense, and time is of the essence.

Dr Schroyens has given his well-produced, well-printed book (in the style of his Synthesis Repertory ) a misleading title. The 150 major medicines are represented, but only by their unique symptoms-the rubrics in which they alone feature. As the author himself says, this can give a very different view of a major drug from that found in materia medicas.

After that, he has chosen a selection of medicines whose size lies next to the major ones. The 1000 or so about which we know least are therefore not represented. Would it have been more useful, I wonder, to include more of these at the expense of those larger ones about which there is plenty of information elsewhere? I wonder. It is a matter for debate.

Dr Schroyens and his team have already demonstrated their dedicated scholarship in the care with which the entries to the Synthesis Repertory are annotated. The same care has been taken with this work; the layout is admirably clear and easy to follow. The symbols used are few and clearly explained in the preface.

My problem with the book is that which I posed earlier-what is it for? It clearly is not for learning materia medica, so is it a useful reference work? It is one of the interesting uses of computerized repertories that they can throw into focus minor drugs which might not otherwise have been noticed. More sophisticated analyses, weighting the information fed into the system, which was not stressed in the teaching of earlier generations, can highlight these minor drugs.

It remains true that polychrests are polychrests, and common drugs common, because they have stood the test of time and served our predecessors well. If well indicated, they are thus likely to remain the ones most often prescribed. But there are more than enough occasions on which we have prescribed them, only to be disappointed by the result, where case review may show that although some of the history fits, other facets do not. This is where the smaller drug comes into its own. Look at the mathematics of it: if there are 8000 references to Sulphur, 100 to Bottomley, and in a given repertorization Sulphur comes top with 20 points, whereas Bottomley has 10, then which is the better indicated? Maybe not all the other features fit the Sulphur picture, leaving the prescriber who knows Sulphur fairly well in some doubt about it. Not having noticed Bottomley before, he rushes off to read it up! But to where does he turn? 1001 Small Remedies? I think not. He should go to his most detailed materia medicas and read it up there, for two reasons: they are more sympathetically laid out, and they contain information which has not found its way into the repertory.

This is one of the chief values of computer repertories, but I'm not sure it extends to the present work. It is certainly an interesting work, and a pleasant book to have, but it is expensive, and it has to be judged in the context of building a homoeopathic library of your own with limited resources. In this context, I'm sorry to say, I would not recommend it to the aspirant homoeopath. For those who already have the computer version of the same work, it is unnecessary. That leaves those with money and no computer, who might well enjoy browsing through it.

JOHN M. ENGLISH

British Homoeopathic Journal
Volume 85, Number 1, January 1996