Homeopathy Papers

Homeopathic Treatment of Cancer

cancer homeopathy

The author (1896 – 1939) describes the treatment of cancer using homeopathy and isopathic methods and specific nosodes. With regard to homeopathy he prescribes the general treatment with constitutional, cancer, drainage and canalization remedies, as well as local treatment. He gives his recommendations differentiating between the treatment of the precancerous and cancer state. Dr. Bernoville was a French Homeopathic Physician, the Chief editor of L’Homeopathie Moderne, one of the founders of the Laboratoire Homeopathiques Modernes, and the founder of the Institut National Homeopathique Francais.

To patients and even to physicians, cancer gives the impression of being the most terrible scourge, which is fatal, pitiless, irremediable as soon as it fixes its signature on the human being. That isn’t always so. Each of the therapeutic methods employed against cancer has really shown itself capable of curing indisputable cases, and even in certain circumstances, though they are rare, one has seen malignant tumors not only remain stationary but even regress and sometimes disappear. However, it is impossible to make use of these facts for the future because of their inconstancy.

The same holds true for classical homeopathy. Some good homeopathic practitioners, as well as some empiricists, after having treated several hundred cases of cancer, have been able to boast, with truth, that they have been able to cure some of these cases. We can admit it, even after excluding the doubtful cases or those unproved because of a lacking biopsy. But one cannot depend on these for they are isolated accomplishments.

The properly called homeopathic treatment can be useful in cancer however; be it to retard the progression of the cancer, be it to palliate against the pains, be it opposed, finally, to the general intoxication, not only in the phase of the confirmed cancer but especially in the pretumoral phase, prophylactic treatment of cancer or the cure of the precancerous state.

However, modern homeopaths, knowing that it is necessary to add more efficacious arms to their traditional arsenal, have been orienting themselves for twenty or thirty years in a channel of specific treatment: tumor extracts, isotherapy, dilutions of products, various discovered organisms in the cancerous masses, whatever their significance may be (generators of lesions or saprophytes only).

Successively, we shall study:

1. The properly called homeopathic treatment.

2. The different specific and isopathic methods which are associated to homeopathy.

  1. HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT

Actually then, the great directing idea of the officials is that cancer is a disease, firstly local, which then generalizes itself, which is only grave because of this generalization and invasion of the body. That which is called the precancerous state exists only in so much local irritation, or the isolated organic inflammation can be the cause for cancer (for example, a proctitis determining a favorable state for the birth of a rectal cancer, a uterine polyp degenerating into a uterine epithelioma, etc.)

Consequence: it is essential to fight these local inflammations, and act aggressively on the tumoral element in order to destroy it (be it by radiation or surgical intervention). The main argument which appears to favor this belief is the relative rarity of relapses of cancers in aggressively treated cases and the exception of cases of primitive tumors appearing successively in different organs in the same patient.

On the contrary, homeopaths believe in general, and other colleagues hold equally to this idea, that there not only exists at the same time but especially for some time before the appearance of a tumor, a general constitutional state or generator of cancer. The local irritation acts only as a focus of localization; it is a thorn due to disturbances of regional tropism (tissue or organ).

Consequence: Know the signs of the precancerous state in order to treat the body before the appearance of the tumor and treat the general state as well as the cancer during or after the latter. The valuable argument in favor of this idea is the possibility of obtaining occasionally a remission or an amelioration, which is only temporary, by acting on the general state and via internal channels.

In reality, if certain officials are strangely blind when they refuse to admit the existence of an already deficient general state in a clinically pretumoral phase, certain traditional homeopaths, especially foreigners, are mistaken, in our opinion, when they neglect the extreme importance of the local factor in cancer as in other affections.

To clarify our demonstration let us take another example: an abscess or phlegmon. Before the appearance of the suppuration one can prove that there exists in the general state of the subject warning disturbances: suppurative tendency; the smallest wound is infected very easily, the patient is fatigued, there often exists cytological transformations, etc. Then the abscess forms. At this moment local signs appear and assume more and more the first position over the signs of general disturbance unless the abscess is opened and the pus exteriorized. In this case, general treatment is useful before and after; the abscess ought to be associated with local measures, in the suppurative phase.

There is likewise in cancer a rational local treatment whose object is the tumoral destruction, be it by irradiation or better still by operative oblation, be it by local application of homeopathic remedies; it should be practiced each time this is possible, for without that the treatment of general detoxification is shown to be insufficient in the greater part of the cases.

lt is then necessary to envisage homeopathic treatment from two aspects:

General (remedies to be prescribed in the precancerous state as well as during the tumoral phase or after it).

Local (treatment only possible in the actual cancer period).

  1. General Treatment

This is composed of:

1. Constitutional remedies

2. Cancer remedies

3. Drainage and canalization remedies

  1. CONSTITUTIONAL REMEDIES

Numerous polychrests, habitually employed as remedies of morbid constitutions, called “basic remedies” or improperly called “constitutional remedies” are quite often indicated in cancerous and precancerous patients. As elsewhere, they can also be prescribed in the greater part of the chronic diseases, as Hahnemann described them. That it may be a question of psora, that state so difficult to define yet so easily recognized; that it may be a question of sycosis in other cases; that psora is identifiable, according to Nebel, with hereditary tuberculosis (with infections of intestinal origin for other authors); that it determines in the subject a state called tuberculinique or pretuberculous in others, or a precancerous diathesis in others; we should only note that, habitually, it is the same great basic remedies which should be prescribed in the first place. Our object here is only a practical one, namely, to present a general view of the treatment of cancer, and it is not an etiologic or pathogenic investigation.

Thus we find that depending on age, sex, race, soil, climate, habits of life, alimentation, morphology, there are a thousand shades which lend these remedies an extraordinary polymorphism. lt is also true that Thuja, Lachesis, Iodium, Silicea, Lycopodium, Sulphur, Sepia, Petroleum, the Calcareas, the Kalis, the Natrums, Carbo vegetabilis and animalis, Graphites, Causticum, Arsenicum album, Phosphorus, Mercurius, Nitric acid, Nux vomica, Ignatia, shall present themselves judiciously to our minds as most often characterizing the morbid state of our patients. They are for us protean remedies, for precise personalities, which are multiple, faceted, variable. They can be described in a different fashion, but as true as any other, as characterizing certain hereditary psoric states in the child, tuberculinique in every age but especially in the young subject (child, adolescent, young adult): or precancerous psoric or precancerous sycotic states in adults and mature people or in the aged who frequently present associations of sycosis and psora.

We lack the space required to describe in a detailed manner the precancerous state as it is manifested in Thuja, Lachesis, Sulphur, etc., as we have previously done for the tuberculinique or tuberculous state (General View of the Present Homeopathic Treatment of Pulmonary Tuberculosis, L’Homeopathic Moderne, Nov. 15, 1932). The reader should refer to the materia medica, which is the premier source of all homeopathic knowledge. Let us limit ourselves by giving only several practical indications of the value of these remedies which are habitually employed in high potency in the precancerous or even cancerous state.

THUJA: This is the king of Hahnemann’s sycosis, the diathesis which is productive of neoplasms, that are, most often, benign. These are warts, condylomata, vegetations, nevi, etc. Sycosis supervenes upon a genital infection, especially gonorrhoea, or after repeated vaccinations which are toxic to the body, especially Jennerian antivariolar vaccination.

Thuja is in the first rank of remedies for the precancerous state. In high potencies it is wise to repeat it rarely, since it can be dangerous and occasionally even precipitate a subject towards a cancerous localization.

In reality, Thuja can also act with success in the confirmed cancer if the latter isn’t too intensely malignant, and if the tumor is still localized. In such cases it can be used for cancer of the breast (degenerated adenoma) and for the cutaneous epitheliomata. In such cases one may be mistaken, perhaps, in prescribing it in too high potencies. Thuja 6 repeated often would appear to act more favorably in certain cutaneous cancers, especially in the cancroids.

LACHESIS: This is also a constitutional remedy of the first order for the precancerous and starting cancer cases. This is especially so in females approaching the fifth decade, following a period of glandular or circulatory disturbances affecting the thyroid, ovaries and liver. These disturbances are often accompanied by vertigo, flashes of heat, palpitations, general hyperaesthesia (cannot tolerate anything tied about the neck, chest or waist) and often, arterial hypertension. If there exists a bloody discharge, the latter ameliorates the patient (especially the periods). If, on the other hand, there is a cessation of the discharge the condition is aggravated (menopause).

In other cases and regardless of sex, the precancerous Lachesis case is intoxicated (alcohol) or jaded. The latter’s intensive creative efforts or inventive researches have profoundly disturbed the humors and destroyed the reserves of nervous energy.

Lachesis even acts well in certain cancers, in high potencies, and without appearing dangerous as Thuja is, even if it is repeated often. Its action is more general on the intoxication of cancerous origin. Thuja has a more localizing action.

IODIUM: This is complementary to Thuja which is also its antidote. Patient is debilitated, weak, and wastes very rapidly in spite of his good appetite. He has the tendency to produce new connective tissues and hard glandular growths (breasts, uterus, lymphatic glands, thyroid, etc.). One must not neglect to prescribe it, for it often has a favorable action on the weight and even on the tumoral element which it can cause to regress or whose induration and invasive tendency it will diminish.

SILICEA: This remedy is also related to Thuja and Iodium. lt acts especially on the connective tissues in which, according to Ribbert, modifications often occur before epithelial neoformation. Lauded by Zeller, Fargas and other authors, it is suitable for the precancerous or cancerous diathesis. lt can be prescribed in cicatricial degenerations (keloids, analogous action to Fluoric acid) and especially in sclerosing tendencies with the production of new fibrous tissues. If Thuja is mentally obsessed, Iodium a depressed melancholic and anxious type, Silicea is a hypersensitive anxious type who is also capable of possessing fixed ideas.

lt is essential often to employ it in middle potencies in tumors and high potencies in the pretumoral phase. Fargas also used Silicic acid in hypodermic injections, he claims with success, in several cases of cancer. Like Iodium, Silicea is demineralized and wastes very rapidly.

LYCOPODIUM: Antipsoric like Calcarea carbonica and Sulphur, Lycopodium evolutes toward cancer through its hepatic insufficiency. Its action fortifies against the precancerous state. In confirmed cancer it barely has any value since it has no power over the tumoral element as have Thuja, Iodium or Silicea.

If the hepatic insufficiency is great it should be cautiously employed in low potencies for even the 30th has often shown itself to be dangerous, in cases of hepatic blockage. lt is here that the necessity for a good preliminary general drainage makes itself felt.

The Lycopodium subject who becomes cancerous will localize his tumor preferentially on the liver, stomach or intestine.

SULPHUR: King of Hahnemann’s antipsorics, Sulphur ought to be reserved for the pretumoral state. lt has no favorable action in a confirmed cancer, even at the start, and can even be dangerous in this case by favoring the propagation of neoplastic cells and the wasting. On the contrary, it is essential to know that it is to be prescribed at times among these patients, generally hypertensives, whose general arterial hypertension is accompanied by an intense portal congestion which is both arterial and venous. This relieves bleeding hemorrhoids. This abdominal arteriovenous hypertension is the prelude of a cancer which will preferably localize itself in the digestive tract or in an abdominal viscus. In these cases an untimely local treatment, as in stopping bleeding hemorrhoids, can be very dangerous.

SEPIA: The morbid personality of Sepia is often noted in subjects in whom cancer is imminent. This remedy, like Sulphur and Lycopodium, acts favorably on a disturbed general state, but not on a tumoral element. lt is characterized by a venous portal hypertension, the abdominal congestion predominating especially in the pelvis, and is not accompanied, as in Sulphur, by an arterial participation. The atony determines ptoses and the “bearing down” sensations. The endocrinal disturbances (liver, adrenals; genitalia) cause the characteristic facies and the cutaneous pigmentary modifications.

Untreated, Sepia will develop rather toward a cancer of the pelvis-uterus, rectum, sigmoid colon, prostate.

PETROLEUM: This remedy is allied to Sulphur. lt is curious to observe the cancerous tendency of Petroleum or of benzol and the derivatives of the oil (Pix liquida and the aniline compounds as I have already recorded). All these products act rather on the neoplastic tendency of the skin. Petroleum has cracks < in winter, by cold. Its intolerance for cabbages is accompanied by digestive disturbances and errors of treatment. lt can also develop toward a neoplasm of the digestive mucosa as well as toward cutaneous cancer. Petroleum directs itself toward surface cancers (skin, mucosa) and not toward bulky cancers (glands).

THE CALCAREAS: Of the three great calcium salts, Calcarea fluorica is the only one which exhibits a neoplastic element. It confers on glands or connective tissue a stony induration. lt is related to Silicea. lt acts as well in breast and uterine cancers as in those in other organs. Calcarea phosphorica has hardly any action either in cancer or in the precancerous state.

Calcarea carbonica – Hahnemann’s great antipsoric – is rather indicated among the precancerous hypothyroids, hypersensitive to cold and chilly, with flaccid muscles and integument, malnourished, invaded by adipose tissue. Blood clotting time is increased. (Joseph Roy in his blood examinations has demonstrated the frequency of too rapid clotting in cancer and precancerous cases.) The subject wastes rapidly after an initial phase of false plethora and fatty invasion. Calcarea carbonica can materialize, therapeutically, demineralizing factor in cancer. lt can act selectively on the glandular hypertrophy. In suspicious and indolent ulcerations, in engorgement of lymph glands, Calcarea iodata will be indicated. Calcarea oxalica should act on the pains in ulcerating cancers.

THE KALIS: lt is known that there exists in cancer disturbances of potassium metabolism as well as those of calcium, sodium and magnesium. To tell the truth, the Kalis are remedies of secondary importance in confirmed cancer. However, the precancerous cases often require Kali carbonicum (weakness, chills, lumbar pains, sweats, wasting) or of Kali bichromicum (gastric or pyloric ulcer which can develop into malignant degeneration; sluggish ulcerations, indolent, with perpendicular borders, thick discharges, viscous and flowing gently).

But we shall think especially of Kali iodatum because of its selective action on the infiltrated connective tissue and on the hypertrophied glands especially after syphilis. Kali arsenicum in inveterate skin diseases with fissures and malignant tendency. Kali cyanatum in lingual cancer.

THE NATRUMS: Natrum muriaticum corresponds much more to the tuberculinique state than to the precancerous state. However, among decalcified subjects it is occasionally indicated. Natrum sulphurium is suitable to the sycotic and hydrogenoid states, sensitive to damp cold, in which the association of sycosis and psora can prepare the birth of a malignant tumor.

THE CARBOS: Carbo vegetabilis, for deficient vitality, for deficient oxygenation and nutrition, presenting a gastrointestinal atony already old and stubborn, may be indicated in cancer (especially digestive) or the precancerous state. But Carbo animalis is one of the best remedies for the established tumor; hard tumor, indurated and swollen lymphatic glands, subcutaneous venous distention, bluish discoloration of infiltrated tissues, burning pains, gastric flatulence. lt has an especial selective action on the breast or stomach cancer and merits special mention not only for its beneficial effects often on the general state (gain of weight or temporary arrest of wasting) but also for its action on the tumor itself which regresses, becomes less hard with amelioration of pains.

GRAPHITES: Subject is extremely psoric, very chilly, oozing eruptions, obstinate constipation. Graphites can characterize, in certain cases, the precancerous state with tendency to induration of tissues and degeneration of cicatrices.

CAUSTICUM: Very clearly this other antipsoric, at the same time sycotic, often veers toward cancer: emaciation, dirty yellow color, terrified aspect, tendency to facial warts, etc. In Causticum, as in other remedies, the mental signs often are of great importance in order to characterize and individualize the patient; the precancerous subject frequently presents a weakened morale, sadness, obsessions, fear of the future, anguish, exaggeration of the sensitivity; likewise, the mental type of Causticum (hypersensitive, altruistic, sadness) or of Thuja (fixed ideas) or of Iodium (anxiety) and other remedies shall have to be considered in the choice of the basic remedy.

ARSENICUM ALBUM: Very important and often indicated, Arsenicum, by its prostration, alternating or coexisting with a certain agitation, by its burning pains, > by heat, its characteristic horary, clearly individualizes many confirmed cancer cases to whom it will often bring a temporary amelioration, transitory or slightly prolonged, as in very weak precancerous subjects. Selective action on the cancroids (with Thuja and Cinnabaris).

PHOSPHORUS: Poorly known, this remedy can clearly act with success before the tumoral phase when the degeneration of a gland and its nuclei is yet hardly delineated. Phosphorus has first a selective action on the higher tissues in contrast to Silicea, its complementary, which presents an efficacy for interstitial tissues. lt is especially in hepatic and pancreatic cancer that Phosphorus appears. Although of secondary importance, it is worthy of attention.

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MERCURIUS: By its nocturnal aggravation, engorgement of lymphatic glands, its bleeding ulcerations, its prostration, its sweats, its oral fetor, Mercurius and its salts can be retained in cancer which is localized on a part of the digestive tract, especially if it follows a former syphilis. The most interesting of the mercury salts is Cinnabaris (or Merurius sulphuratus ruber) in condylomata which may or may not be degenerated.

NITRIC ACID: Let us remember of this remedy, complementary to Mercurius and Calcarea carbonica, its tendency to fissures and painful ulcerations (sensation of fine needles), the debility, the demineralization, the progressive wasting and thinning. lt is to be thought of, then, in confirmed cancer in which it can act, if not on the general state, at least on the painful element.

NUX VOMICA and IGNATIA: Finally, these two strychnias which are not, properly speaking, remedies for the precancerous state. They merit mention, however, because of the frequency and importance of their mental signs and the beneficial action they are capable of establishing in the neuro-vegetative system and morale of our patients who are cancerous or have a cancerous tendency.

Such are the principal constitutional remedies we ought to review. The dilutions in which they ought to be employed are variable enough. In a general way, the high potencies will be reserved for the precancerous state; the low and middle potencies for the confirmed cancers.

Let us hasten to add that the results obtained with these remedies alone are very uncertain, the cases of real cure very rare, simple amelioration very variable in confirmed neoplasms. On the other hand, in multiple precancer cases success is frequent. Unfortunately, it is actually impossible, error of criterium and certainty, to give proof of such accomplishments. The practitioner is deeply convinced of it. lt is an impression valuable to himself alone.

  1. THE PROPERLY CALLED CANCER REMEDIES

They are very numerous in the classical homeopathic arsenal. We shall study them very briefly by classifying them a little arbitrarily into several groups for the convenience of our work.

  1. The Most Habitual Remedies.

These are the ones which have revealed themselves as having the most constant action on the tumoral element as well as the general state.

SEDUM ACRE and SEDUM REPENS: The value of Sedum acre was especially called to my attention by the lamented Abbe Keul. In material doses, mother tincture, 1X and 3X, it has an undeniable action on cancer in general, gives weight to the patients, and occasionally modifies the tumor, or at least retards its progress. Their principal sign is their tendency to mucosal and cutaneous fissures which are so frequent in cancer or the precancerous state. The pathogenesis of these two remedies is incomplete. Because of that we must be satisfied to use them in an empirical fashion. Sedum repens acts especially on the abdominal organs. Sedum teleplium, another plant of the same family, should act especially on the uterus or cancerous rectum with hemorrhages.

SCROFULARIA NODOSA: This remedy acts especially on cancers of breast, skin, uterus, rectum, in low potencies or material doses, especially if there is marked glandular invasion. A. Nebel praised its drainage action; Cooper insisted very much on its value.

SEMPERVIVUM TECTORUM: Lingual, breast, rectal and other cancers. Its tendency to aphthae, to malignant ulcers ‚ specially indicate it in the ulcerated cancer. lt can also be used in mother tincture or low potencies.

CARBO ANIMALIS: Already studied as a constitutional remedy of great value.

CUNDURANGO: I have personally observed the value of Cundurango in esophageal, stomach or intestinal cancers. One of its valuable external signs consists in fissures of the labial commissures. lt also acts on cancer situated at the junction of mucosa and skin: lips, anus, lid. Low or middle potencies.

CISTUS CANADENSIS: This remedy acts especially in cancer of the breast, pharynx, or neck and gives rise to very marked cervical adenopathy. Chronic rhinopharyngitis. Extreme sensitivity to cold.

HYDRASTIS: As good for the breast as for the stomach, Hydrastis is of great value in cancer, ulcerated not, with progressive debility, wasting emaciation; hypochlorhydria is frequent before and during the phase of gastric cancer.

KREOSOTUM: Bleeding ulcerations, vegetations develop rapidly and emit a burning discharge, excoriating, fetid; such are the principal signs of Kreosote which acts especially well in cancer of the cervix.

ORNITHOGALUM: Already noted by Cooper, then used by Gisevius and other authors, especially in low potencies or material doses. This remedy has a remarkable action in the pyloroduodenal sphere whether it acts on an ulcer or an established cancer.

PHYTOLACCA: Here again is a remedy which must not be neglected in hard or scirrhous tumors, since it can soften and diminish them, or slightly malignant cancers which develop slowly (breast scirrhus) or on suspected tumors which have not yet degenerated (parotids). But it has several indisputable cases of cure to its credit. Syphilis is habitual among its antecedents. Low potencies.

  1. Remedies for Pain

ARSENICUM ALBUM and NITRIC ACID: already studied among the constitutional remedies, dominate this group; the first with its burning pains, the second with its sensation of fine needles.

APIS: continues the series; burning pricks as with red hot needles.

ARNICA: bruised pains. Especially useful in breast adenoma following traumatism. The adenoma may or may not be degenerated.

BRYONIA: amelioration through rest and strong pressure (especially for breast cancer which ought to be supported or bound).

CALCAREA ACETICA: many pains, often constrictive.

EUPHORBIUM: burning or lancinating pains, pustular ulcerations.

MAGNESIA PHOSPHORICA: spasmodic pains (non-burning), > by heat.

RUTA: bruised pains, deep pains, osseous or periosteal. Intense weakness. Selective spheres, bone periosteum, cartilage, rectum.

  1. Tumor Remedies.

The remedies chosen for their action on the malignant tumor itself have selective effects on a tissue or organ. Let us study here preferably the tissue remedies reserving for drainage and canalization the indications of visceral affinities of these vegetables and minerals.

SILICEA: constitutional remedy which acts on the connective and interstitial tissues; satellites are Silicic acid, praised by Fargas; Calcarea silicata (emaciation, sensitive to cold); Lapis albus so useful in simple uterine fibromas with adhesions (Calcium silico-fluoride).

BARYTA CARBONICA: acts also on the sclerosed or indurated tissues, especially in breast adenomas, degenerated or not; Aurum metallicum, Aurum arsenicum and Aurum muriaticum natronatum and Plumbum iodatum, all act especially on the indurated, scirrhous, non-vegetating forms.

SELENIUM is also praised here; debility, wasting, possible tendency to sarcomas.

Let us not forget the Calcareas which act on the lymphatic glands; Calcarea fluorica has a double action, connective tissues and glands.

On osseous tissue: Silicea, Aurum, Ruta (which also acts in rectal cancer) and especially Symphytum.

  1. Several Minerals and Acids

Secondly, different mineral salts and acids have been proposed in the treatment of cancer with variable results, most often negative. Let us rapidly enumerate after Nitric acid, which has already been studied and is of value: Acetic acid, used internally and externally by W. Owens; Carbolic acid, whose sudden pains are terrible, the discharges putrid; this remedy acts well, especially in ulcerating cancer of the uterine cervix, Formic acid, used in low potencies, 3x and 4x and is as good in cancer as in deforming rheumatism.

After Calcarea iodata, Calcarea oxalica, Kali iodatum, Kali arsenicum, Kali cyanatum, Plumbum iodatum—already cited above—let us indicate Cinnabaris, the value of which Dr. LeTellier recently pointed out to me when used in the 3c alternating with Thuja 6 in the cancroids of the face (following his personal practice, after having observed a case of Dr. Conan, Sr.). Carboneum sulphuratum is also useful in neuritis and paralyses; Ova tosta used for the cancer pains and warts; Arsenicum bromatum in the indurated tumors with weakness and eruptive or ulcerating tendency; Antimonium chloridum in mucosal cancers with great prostration.

  1. Other Remedies.

GALIUM APARINE: Incomplete pathogenesis. Ulcerated cancers and nodular tumors of the skin and tongue developing on the surface. Acts also on the urinary organs (urinary lithiasis).

FULIGO LIGNI: Useful in epitheliomata of the skin and for irritated mucosa, especially uterus and scrotum. Related to Kreosotum.

HOANG-NAN: Exhaustion and vertigo. Capable of ameliorating the fetidity and hemorrhages of cancer by causing an improvement in the general condition. Related to Arsenicum album.

CINNAMONUM: Pain, hemorrhage, fetidity. Should act especially in uterine cancer.

ANANTHERUM: Ulcerated cancers, inflamed lymphatic glands. Induration of breasts or tongue or uterine cervix.

CHOLINE: Alkaloid of Taraxacum used by Adamkiewicz. Taraxacum is a good drainer of the precancerous state through its action on the liver.

CHOLESTERINUM: In hepatic cancer.

EOSINE: Burning pains of cancer, according to Woodbury.

RADIUM BROMIDE: Weakness, vertigo, tendency to cutaneous epitheliomata.

X-RAYs: According to Dr. Chiron these two remedies antidote each other. Radium bromide antidotes the bad effects of x-ray irradiation in a patient who has been treated too intensely. Likewise the x-rays antidote the unfortunate effects of radium in patients who have been treated by it.

We will note in a general way that all these medicaments ought to be employed in low potencies, occasionally even in material doses, in mother tincture for the vegetables. A number of them will also be used in local applications. The indefiniteness of their pathogenic indications will have to be compensated little by little through clinical experience, and especially by new experimentation to be carried out in the future.

  1. DRAINAGE AND CANALIZATION REMEDIES

In cancer, as in tuberculosis it is essential to act in a centripetal sense in order to retain the mineral salts and prevent malnutrition (constant struggle against wasting). We must also neutralize or eliminate in a centrifugal sense, the toxins elaborated in the body. That is why, in accordance with A. Nebel, we drain our patients.

Drainage ought to be directed, if possible, via the local selective action of certain well individualized remedies. A. Nebel has praised a profitable remedial association used in drainage; Chelidonium, Hydrastis, Crataegus, China; Scrofularia nodosa, in tincture, whose action compels us to retain it also in the precancerous states. We have also noted the value of certain remedies which appear to act well according to the hypothesis of drainage: Sedum acre, Phytolacca, the first for the general condition and the tumor, the second appearing to produce its effects in the tumor class.

First Cooper, then LeHunte Cooper, showed the value of the action of homeopathic remedies administered in material doses, one or two drops of a well prepared tincture which have a selective action on certain regions or viscera.

That is why we ought to indicate here, more especially, the local selective action of homeopathic remedies in cancer. We have arranged the following table which is prepared for additions and modifications that are always possible.

LIPS: Condurango

TONGUE: KALI CYANATUM (inconstant action; note that the saliva contains small quantities of potassium ferrocyanate): SEMPERVIVUM TECTORUM, Galium aparine.

PHARYNX: Cistus canadensis

ESOPHAGUS: Condurango

STOMACH: Carbo animalis, Condurango, Hydrastis, Lycopodium, Kali bichromicum

PYLORUS and DUODENUM: ORNITHOGALUM

INTESTINES: CONDURANGO, CARBO ANIMALIS, ARSENICUM ALBUM, Sedum repens, Petroleum

CAECUM: Ornithogalum

SIGMOID COLON and RECTUM: RUTA, SCROFULARIA NODOSA, SEMPERVIVUM TECTORUM

ANUS: Condurango

LIVER: CHOLESTERINUM, LYCOPODIUM, PHOSPHORUS, Choline

PANCREAS: Phosphorus

UTERUS: AURUM MURIATICUM NATRONATUM, KREOSOTUM, Cinnamonum, Sepia

BREASTS: ASTERIAS RUBENS, CONIUM, CARBO ANIMALIS, HYDRASTIS, SEMPERVIVUM TECTORUM, Plumbum iodatum, Thuja

TESTICLES: AURUM METALLICUM

SCROTUM: Fuligo ligni

SKIN: SCROFULARIA NODOSA, CONDURANGO, GALIUM APARINE, ABSENICUM ALBUM, THUJA, CINNABARIS, Petroleum, Kali arsenicum, Radium bromide

EYE: CONDURANGO (lids)

PERIOSTEUM: Ruta, Symphytum, Phosphorus

LYMPHATIC GLANDS in general: Carbo animalis

GLANDS in general: Scrofularia nodosa, Iodium, Calcarea fluorica

FACE: THUJA, CINNABARIS

NECK: Cistus canadensis, Mercurius (parotids)

In a general way we must note that all treatment whose object it is to ameliorate the functions of the various glands in the body, and especially the liver, shall constitute in itself a therapy, of effective drainage against the danger of cancer. lt can even ameliorate the state of an inflamed cancer case. That is why we must not neglect the value of organotherapy in this question, although in the tumor phase glandular extracts can hardy act favorably anymore. The same does not apply to the precancerous. Let us especially note the need to achieve good hepatic function, liver drainage in its biliary and centrifugal functions as well as in its endocrinal and humoral work. Taraxacum, Chelidonium, Carduus marianus, Cholesterinum, etc., all the draining and canalizing remedies of the liver will play a very important part in the precancerous state if they are judiciously prescribed.

It is also possible that in this case the deficiency of certain mineral salts can be compensated by a therapy depending on the addition to the daily alimentary regime of this or that product. We must study here not only the disturbances of metabolism of magnesium, but of calcium, sodium and potassium as well. In order do this it is not necessary to give high doses of magnesium salts, for under the pretext of combating a possible cancer one would too often provoke the appearance a very bad subacute or chronic nephritis.

B. Local Treatment

We must not neglect local treatment in cancer. In the struggle against the body and the tumor, the destruction of the latter, when this is possible, will naturally benefit the patient. Homeopaths would be mistaken to deny it. Certain officials deceive themselves by placing their confidence only in this single extirpating or destructive therapy.

Operative intervention, judicious and so beneficial when it is precocious and not very mutilating; radiotherapy or curietherapy is a two-edged sword which must be cautiously used following long clinical experience and in very distinct cases (radium for tongue and cervix, epitheliomata of skin, etc.). Homeopathy and its doctrine ought not to drive us to such a degree of sectarianism that we should wish to deny them. That would be an error. We ought only to combat their excessive use. Each time it can be done let us choose electrocoagulation, whose practice is free from so many dangers and reverses.

But we must know well the value of certain of our remedies, especially vegetables, used locally by means of baths or compresses containing the mother tinctures. Their action is such that excluding the specific type malignancy or the anatomopathological form of the tumor (spino or basal cell) the single act of local treatment will be able to change completely our prognosis in the different neoplasms.

From the morphological point of view let us consider cancer. lt can be external or internal. External, more accessible, it is then more accessible to our compresses soaked in the mother tinctures. The cancer can be on the surface. On the surface it especially affects the mucosa or the skin; it extends in two dimensions above all. In the third dimension it ravages the glands and its increase in volume will be the cause for a more rapid and grave fatality. Our local treatment will act preferentially on the cancer which is directly accessible on the surface, tongue, skin, breasts, stomach, cervix, rectum.

According to the cases of our personal experience, we sprinkle on a moist compress, preferably flannel of double thickness, several drops (v, x, xx) of a judiciously chosen tincture. After dressing (non-absorbent cotton and bandage) which is renewed one to three times daily, will diminish the surface and volume of the tumor. Its consistence will be changed, the neoplasm will become softer. Sometimes it will even ulcerate in order to better eliminate a part of its excretions. The beneficial action will also be able to extend to the glands.

The tinctures we most often use are: Sedum repens, Phytolacca, Scrofularia nodosa, Hydrastis (all cancers); Condurango, Ornithogalum, Conium (stomach), Conium (breast), Calendula (ulcerated cancers). I have not much experience with Sempervivum tectorum, Galium aparine, Symphytum, but we must not neglect them either.

  1. ISOPATHIC METHODS AND SPECIFIC NOSODES

For several years the tendency has been to discover distinctly in cancer as in other diseases, a specific treatment at the base of which are organisms or various extracts isolated from the cancerous tissues. This tendency is followed today, not only by homeopaths but by other colleagues as well. They have been led in this direction themselves by a natural mental evolution. This has been in the direction of the general homeopathic philosophy.

The remedies proposed in this fashion have been numerous. We shall attempt to give an almost complete list of them with some brief explanations of their fields and indication.

  1. Specific Methods

1. Homeopathic potencies of cancerous fluids have been made for a long time: Epitheliomine (extract of epithelioma), Scirrhinum (extract of scirrhus), Carcinosine (extract of any cancer). The results obtained have been inconstant and variable.

2. More interesting is the work of Cahis of Barcelona, who has studied this question a great deal and who used Cancero-toxin administered according to a special scale of potencies, or again Pan-Cancro (we shall be very thankful to Dr. Cahis if he would be willing, providing his health permits, to send us some articles of his Homeopathic Testament with his very original reflections and explanations of his method).

3. Attempts have been made to isolate one or more cancer organisms and to prescribe them in homeopathic dilutions. That the isolated organisms may perhaps be only witnesses or saprophytes or profiteers in the tumor, rather than its deep and real cause, is not the question. lt is not less true than in certain cases products of this kind show themselves to be efficacious. lt is to M. Nebel that we owe our Micrococcin (Doyen’s Micrococcus in the 30th, 200th and higher) and to Joseph Roy his Oscillococcin. The latter often acts with great benefit in those predisposed to cancer but it is dangerous and can aggravate the confirmed cancer cases, even according to the author. On the other hand, Micrococcin has often a really beneficial action, if not durable, at least temporary and distinct, on the weight and general condition.

The optimal potency would seem to be the 200th. It is not necessary to repeat it more often than once every two or three months. Before that the patient ought be well drained. He ought to receive regularly also, at ten, fifteen or twenty day intervals, his constitutional remedy.

4. Dr. Nebel uses especially in cancer potencies his Onkomyxa (preferably the 4th, subcutaneously). One can learn through the book he has published the gist of his thoughts on this subject.

5. The employment of potencies of blood in cancer or precancer cases has been thought of; Following Roger, Joseph Roy, the first in France, used individual blood therapy. J. Roy has now abandoned this practice, finding it dangerous and of only transient action. In my opinion the truth is perhaps here in a golden mean; believe neither in a marvelous therapeutic action of a miraculous panacea nor in the converse. lt is certain that one ought to be very cautious about using potencies of blood from cancer cases. Aggravations are to be feared. We have also been witnesses, however, to beautiful ameliorations. lt would be necessary to be able to isolate from the blood the really homeopathic principle which is capable of curative action; a principle which ought to be restrained, neutralized unfortunately by other substances, other forces. Clinical experience is the only method capable of judging the results of this method and not, in our opinion, philosophical concepts, which were conceived a priori. Since then J. Roy has preferred to use isotherapy of young and healthy blood, of which we have no personal experience. Now it would seem to veer more towards organotherapy. In the same sense, Guild has previously used serum-vaccines with variable results.

6. Rubens-Duval had the idea of using globulin extracts from cancers. This is his proteinotherapy described by himself in this revue. His results are very encouraging and impressive and the indicated dilutions are distinctly homeopathic.

7. Following many authors, Cuvier and Carrere have recently re-attacked the question of treatment with tumor extracts and have some very interesting results.

  1. Non-Specific Nosodes

1. Psorinum is often used by homeopaths in the cancerous or the precancerous as a constitutional remedy.

2. In England, Bach and Dishington have used their nosodes taken from cultures of intestinal organisms which are nonlactose fermenters; Gaertner, Morgan, Dysentericus, Proteus, are proposed. Here are their indications:

In carcinoma: Morgan and Dysenterius

In sarcoma: Morgan and Gaertner

The Gaertner bacillus appears to act clearly on the indurated tumors, especially abdominalis, when the stool analysis reveals the presence of this organism. The 30th is the preferable potency.

In other cancer cases, Proteus has seemed to be much indicated. We have not had much experience in France with these remedies; the organisms they individualize are, besides, only rarely met with in the intestines of our compatriots outside of cases of bacillary dysentery.

3. Schlegel of Tubingen often uses Tuberculinum and Syphilinum in the cancerous. Cooper also used Tuberculinum. In a similar fashion, depending on the etiology, or terrain, Medorrhinum (gonorrhoeal nosode) has been prescribed, or Malandrinum (glanders nosode; Cooper indicated it in cancer).

4. Starting from philosophical and metaphysical ideas, Rudolf Steiner noted that the mistletoe (Viscum album) ought to be a real specific remedy in cancer. That is why the Anthroposophists, including Kaelin, use different kinds of mistletoe for the cancerous. The results obtained should be extremely encouraging. The blood of the patient is gradually diluted in glass cylinders and rises up a length of filter paper; at the height of its ascent he describes special figures which determine whether or not cancer exists and also its factor of gravity. Potencies of mistletoe are capable of modifying these results in the sense of reestablishing the natural formula. One employs dilutions 50/100 of the plant, from 1 to 28 in progressively increasing doses, which is the converse of classical homeopathy. We only know the action of Viscum album in renal sclerosis and Bright’s disease with hypertension. lt would be necessary to take up again Kaelin’s experience. I had the honor of assisting at this work at Arlesheim in 1929 and it appeared very interesting to me. Reports of this appeared in the revue Natura.

CONCLUSION

How are cancer cases to be treated at the present time? Let us briefly indicate how a modern homeopath can and ought to treat a cancer patient each time medical treatment is necessary or only possible.

1. The precancerous state: One ought systematically to search for the existence of a tendency to cancer in every subject over forty years. Were there any cancer cases in the parents or family? This is very important as this has been demonstrated in the systematic examination we never fail to make.

Was there syphilis or gonorrhoea, or repeated vaccinations or even a former psoric, tuberculinique or tuberculous state? All these morbid manifestations appear often in different degrees; the first two especially predispose to malignancy. Do there exist certain signs of the precancerous state such as yellow spots on the skin, naevi (signs of Thuja), or again, a disturbed mental state through the morbid fear of cancer? Truthfully, these symptoms have but a reduced value because of their frequency, or better still, we must consider all patients today as being precancerous if they are matured. Cancer is at most a precipice which all ought compulsorily to scale at a certain time in life and from which the unfortunate fall….. In spite of all affirmations, unfortunately, cancer can very well appear even in subjects seriously or regularly followed. What is more important is to appreciate the general vitality of the subject.

We must fear cancer following a period of marked weakness, general or localized atony in the susceptible which can present the feared tumor, hepatic insufficiency with induration and swelling of the liver, changes in the attitude and appearance of the patient who stoops, whose complexion becomes wan, the facial lines drawn. One may fear an abdominal cancer coming with excessive and stubborn distension of the abdomen, with loss of elasticity and resistance of the tissues to palpation and modifications of the percussion note. But all this constitutes more a vague picture which leads the mind intuitively towards the hypothesis of the menace of cancer rather than by a logical and sure reasoning. That is why, in our opinion, one of the best signs is simply the wasting. Let us fear the progressive and inexplicable loss of weight in every subject between the age of forty and fifty, and older. That indicates a general intoxication, prelude of a palpable and visible tumor. What we call the precancerous state includes, in large part besides, the still microscopic existence of the tumor in the form of some few degenerated cells.

lt would be useful to have in this case a laboratory criterion. lt is here that the Douris and Mondain blood drop test can be very useful.

Treatment should consist in the prescription of the constitutional remedy and in the most serious general drainage of the subjects. Results will be excellent most often. lt will be impossible, and with truth, to affirm that one has been able to avoid in a patient an always hypothetical cancer; but the general impression is in favor of a favorable prophylactic action of the scourge.

2. Cancer: Without hoping for too much but with an absolute tenacity let us treat the established cancer cases. If we can almost never cure it, at least let us be able to hope in obtaining quite often a certain equilibrium, which is more or less stable, between the patient and his disease. This means a survival sometimes of five, six, ten years or more.

One of our friends succeeded in saving thus a servant in his employ for twelve years. She had a generalized and incurable breast cancer surrounded by multiple glandular chains. Such cases are not rare. Personally, we have obtained it in ten malignant breast tumors, in two cases of cutaneous neoplasm, in three cases of gastric epitheliomata. Half of these patients still live, some treated by us for six or seven years. The tumors always exist, more or less diminished or as large, but the patients are living and that is essential. We do not know if that will last for a long time yet, but such results, though inconstant and even rare in comparison to the total of treated cases, are all the same encouraging.

The weight curve, in our opinion, as in tuberculosis, is paramount to correct and consult. The patient should be weighed each week. This curve will govern the repetition of the constitutional remedies or the nosodes. Likewise, the Douris and Mondain blood drop test should be regularly performed. The weight curve will very quickly tell us the results and hopes which one can expect from the given treatment.

We should look after the morale of our patients. We should absolutely avoid letting them know their disease; we should shelter them from moral and emotional shocks.

Plenty of food, healthful, rich in vitamins, poor in spiced and nitrogenous elements should be given. Well prepared dishes will stimulate the appetite essential to the gain in weight.

Cautiously, without too much repetition, the constitutional remedies and nosodes should be prescribed (the 200th every ten to twenty days; the 1M every fifteen to forty days, on the average) as the specified remedies according to the methods of Nebel, Rubens-Duval, etc.

At the same time one should give to the subject the strictly indicated homeopathic remedies and a judicious drainage should be instituted for glandular, humoral, cellular tissues. The patient should be remineralized.

One should not forget the local state at the expense of the body. Each time it is possible, applications of compresses soaked in mother tinctures of well chosen plants should be employed.

The patient should be followed with great care in order to gather the slightest signs of change in the condition. Acting thus, we should save the great part of these cases certain suffering and their death should be easier. In certain cases survival should be prolonged and in other cases, rare to be truthful we shall obtain perhaps – who knows? – the joy of an unforeseen cure.

To attend without sectarianism and only to cure, to be always ready to use every method with distinctly superior results, old or new, seductive or formidable foreign or natural, accord to general principles, to abstract or philosophical ideas on the value of a beacon of orientation, the last word, above all to be decided by accomplishments Flee the charm of the dreams of false occultism, trust only the faithful and monotonous common sense. Such shall be our guides in treating our patients in cancer and other affections, with conscientiousness, patience and tenacity.

Presented by Katja Schütt, Hpathy.

About the author

Mauritius Fortier-Bernoville

Mauritius (Maurice) Fortier Bernoville 1896 – 1939 MD was a French orthodox physician who converted to homeopathy to become the Chief editor of L’Homeopathie Moderne (founded in 1932; ceased publication in 1940), one of the founders of the Laboratoire Homeopathiques Modernes, and the founder of the Institut National Homeopathique Francais.

Bernoville was a major lecturer in homeopathy, and he was active in Liga Medicorum Homeopathica Internationalis, and a founder of the le Syndicat national des médecins homœopathes français in 1932, and a member of the French Society of Homeopathy, and the Society of Homeopathy in the Rhone.

Fortier-Bernoville wrote several books, including Une etude sur Phosphorus (1930), L'Homoeopathie en Medecine Infantile (1931), his best known Comment guerir par l'Homoeopathie (1929, 1937), and an interesting work on iridology, Introduction a l'etude de l'Iridologie (1932).

With Louis-Alcime Rousseau, he wrote several booklets, including Diseases of Respiratory and Digestive Systems of Children, Diabetes Mellitus, Chronic Rheumatism, treatment of hay fever (1929), The importance of chemistry and toxicology in the indications of Phosphorus (1931), and Homeopathic Medicine for Children (1931). He also wrote several short pamphlets, including What We Must Not Do in Homoeopathy, which discusses the logistics of drainage and how to avoid aggravations.

He was an opponent of Kentian homeopathy and a proponent of drainage and artificial phylectenular autotherapy as well.

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