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How often it happens in our clinical practice that after giving a medicine, we are not able to judge the direction in which the case is moving. If the patient says he is improving, we become happy. If the presenting complaints disappear, we become certain of our cures. We all learn how to take a case and how to select a similimum, but very few of us work on 'what to do after giving a medicine?'. Dr. Vijayakar's 'Theory of Suppression' dwells on all these issues and gives much more to think. The book begins with an understanding that homeopathy medicines can suppress and a large number of homeopaths suppress their cases with ill selected similimums or combination medicines. Dr. Vijayakar has used his extensive knowledge of embryology and human physiology to understand the direction of growth, direction of disease, direction of suppression, and the direction of cure. In a very logical and analytical manner, the progression of disease from ectoderm, to mesoderm, to endoderm has been elaborated. The author has described seven layers of suppression depending upon the embryonic origin of tissue. The work is filled with many lucid examples which help one to understand the theory better. This understanding of the disease progression lets you judge the direction of a case after giving a remedy. The Hering's Law of Cure has been reinterpreted and elaborated in the light of this new understanding of disease progression. The law that very few of us follow properly has been given a new thrust and understanding. It makes you marvel the genius of Hering who gave this law so long ago, without any knowledge of embryology or physiology. Dr. Vijayakar's approach has made this arbitrary law so strong that it can be followed with mathematical precision. The author then deals with the analysis of the case direction after giving a remedy. With elaborate examples, the author lays down the guidelines to judge the patients progress. The second prescription becomes much more easy and meaningful if you grasp these guidelines. Dr. Vijayakar's approach is to focus on the 'Man who has the Disease' and not on the 'Disease in the Man'. For e.g.., If a patient comes to you with urethral stricture, do not treat the stricture with clematis or thiosinamin. The authors approach is to find out the basic characters of the person (who has the stricture) and give a medicine which is similar to the person not just to the disease - what Dr. Vijayakar calls his Genetic Constitutional Similimum. These concepts may not seem novel to most homeopaths but the way Dr. Vijayakar has presented them is very novel and interesting. Dr. Vijayakar's approach can help any homeopath to reduce the uncertainties in his/her clinical practice. The approach is very scientific, logical, and easy to understand. Dr. Vijayakar's work can prove to be one of the most significant contributions in the field of homeopathy in the recent times. Having said that I must point to some gray areas that need to be worked upon. The theory, while very useful, leaves little scope for any therapeutic use of medicines. What do we do with the thousands of homeopathy medicines, which do not have well defined physical and psychological constitutions? What do we do with Scholten's work and all those dream provings? Where do all these fit in? Also, what type of mental symptoms will appear at which level of suppression needs to be elaborated properly. Dr. Vijayakar's work needs a good basic understanding of human physiology, anatomy and embryology, a very keen sense of observation, and a good command over repertory and materia medica. The concepts might be easy to understand but their proper application will need lot of hard work from the beginners. Still, I feel that the rewards would justify the hard work. This is a book to recommend to everyone. It forces you to sit up and think about the way you have been curing(!) your cases all those years. This books gives you food for thought and has a lot of individuality to it! |
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