Metals in Homeopathy

Review

This book review is reprinted from Volume 23, Spring 2010 edition, with permission from Homeopathic Links.

Reviewed by Kaare Troelsen, Denmark

When I got the mail from Narayana Publishers concerning the new book by Patricia Le Roux about Metals in Homeopathy I was very excited, especially because it was illustrated through pediatric cases. Le Roux is prescribing many of the new remedies according to the homeopathic understanding of the Periodic Table, which is not always easy.

I hoped this book would shed light on all the lesser known remedies in the iron, silver and gold series. Le Roux is presenting cases of all the elements of these three rows, which is quite a feat. They are all cases of single elements, not salts combined of two elements, as in simple Kalium, simple Calcium etc. I hoped to get in-depth clarification of the nature of these rarely seen single elements.

I am sorry to say that I was disappointed.

The book starts with an ultrashort introduction to the idea of the periodic table as an analogue to human stages of development, which is acceptable if you are already well versed in Scholten's (or Sankaran's) ideas. If you are not, you need to read Scholten. This very brief way of explaining concepts runs through the entire book and I think this is a major problem. Three rows times eighteen cases (one for each stage) for remedies with relevant materia medica and concepts in 350 pages is quite condensed when trying to explain the prescription and effect of many new and little-known remedies. The cases are ultrashort and the choice of remedy is sometimes explained with only a few lines. Remedies that do already have known materia medica are often followed by pages from Robin Murphy's materia medica, or, if there is no proving, materia medica from Scholten's work. These passages generally take up much more space than the case and analysis.

Le Roux is a skilled practitioner and obviously has a lot of clinical experience. I wish that she trusted her own experience and would take time to explain why she chose the remedy and how she sees it. This would have made the book more interesting.

Every remedy chapter is concluded with a short resume of the remedy as seen in the concept of the periodic table, written by Le Roux. It includes keynotes and ends with a one-liner conclusion of the "essence" of the remedy, for example: "Antimonium metallicum is indicated when an Antimony profile emerges with a functional metallic dynamic" or "Osmium is a remedy for children who are initially lazy, but once they get going they'll move mountains", or "The element Calcium is often useful with children identified as Calcarea carbonica, when the Carbonate radical is less in evidence." These statements are often very general or too abstract because they are not well explained, so they have no really useful function or effect as to the readers' understanding of the subject.

Most of the cases presented have extremely short follow-up that only continues a few months after the first prescription; normally a much longer follow-up period is required to document a good prescription. Some cases are not convincing at all, like the Vanadium case where the patient has a severe aggravation after the first dose and is hospitalized, then Lac caninum is prescribed and when she returns the following year she is better. This is not even a well documented Lac caninum case and not a convincing Vanadium case, except in theory.

If Le Roux had been more critical of her material, focused on the really good cases and taken the time to thoroughly convey the analysis and full understanding of the case and the remedy, this book would have been useful. I am sure she has the knowledge. It seems as if she was in a hurry to put the book together and had the fixed idea that she had to present a case of all the single elements, even if she did not have good cases for all of them. Le Roux chose to present as many short cases as possible followed by fairly one-dimensional essences and dry materia medica lists in a powerpoint presentation style and pace. Unfortunately there is no synthesis of the disparate facts.

What kind of book did she intend? A compilation of old materia medica explained in the context of the new understanding of the elements or a solid and practical casebased presentation of Scholten's theories? Both would have been great, but this is unfortunately neither.

This book review is reprinted with the permission from the Winter 2009 Edition of The Homeopath.

Reviewed by Francis Treuherz

The title essences and paediatric cases is a good description of the contents of this book, but there is even more: how many of us have seen, and helped, sufficient child patients to have prescribed 54 polychrest or rare remedies from this list of metals? Patricia Le Roux has already published paediatric cases of other families: milks" acids' and butterflies). With this book on remedies from metals she boldly enters centre stage, demonstrating real insights into materia medica and case management. Here is a combination at least 3 schools of homeopathic thinking, the 'minimum symptoms of maximum value' from the French school of Didier Grandgeorge, the use of the periodic table of the elements from Jan Scholten, and the 'sensation method' of Rajan Sankaran.

There are some helpful introductory chapters, a reprise of the 'horizontal series' and the 'vertical stages', and a summary of the Iron, Silver and Gold series in turn. The author assumes no prior knowledge of chemistry, I am glad to say. Almost each remedy contains a case description; a few remedies are so rare that they have still not been properly described or prescribed. There is an essence description, and added materia medica from published sources, notably from Scholten, which is obviously the sourcebook for metals. She also uses a great deal of material verbatim from Murphy and others. This is almost my only criticism, in that Murphy's work is itself text taken from other materia medica, and then it is not in the traditional top-to-toe order of the 'schema'. But on the other hand this adds some useful information to her sometimes scanty, almost experimental initial prescriptions. The remedies being described in series shows how each one is linked to its neighbour in the table. As the remedies are not discussed in alphabetical order, and there are comparisons with other remedies, an index should have been seen as essential and is absent. The translation is excellent.

As examples I shall cite the studies of Cadmium and Tellurium. I had only ever prescribed Cadmium for adults4, I knew of it in connection with influenza, facial paralysis, coldness and cancer, from Grimmer and Gutman as my main srouces. Le Roux gives us an essence of 'a real feeling of impotence, and the vision of a potential artistic future in ruins'. Tellurium I have only ever prescribed in ringworm and stinky discharges from the ear. 'Here we have a remedy for arrogant adolescents, who live in a fantasy world and excel in on the spot improvisations'. There are also many useful insights about polychrests like Aurum or Plumbum for children. I have often heard students complain at the dearth of mature books about homeopathy for children. Here is one I can heartily recommend.