NIPAH Virus Possible Roles of Homeopathy

• Home
• Blog
• NIPAH Virus Possible Roles of Homeopathy

STUDY REPORT SUBMITTED BY THE EXPERT COMMITTEE APPOINTED BY IHMA KERALA TO IDENTIFY A PROBABLE HOMOEOPATHIC GENUS EPIDEMICUS FOR THE CURRENT VIRAL EPIDEMIC – 2018 – IN KERALA. (THE REPORT WAS FORWARDED TO DMO, DEPARTMENT OF HOMOEOPATHY, KOZHIKODE.)

Expert committee members:

Dr.Saji K, MD(Hom) Repertory. (Senate Member KUHS.)
Dr.Dinesh.R.S, MD(Hom) Materia Medica; MBBS, MD(Psychiatry); Psychiatrist, Mental Hospital Trivandrum.
Dr.Siju Joseph Seena, BHMS; MSC Epidemiology, Consultant Epidemiologist.
Dr.Amar Bodhi, MD(Hom) Organon; Lecturer, B.R.Sur Homoeopathic Medical College, New Delhi.

Introduction:

In the last few years, pre monsoon viral fevers took the life of a considerable number of patients in our state and in spite of adequate preventive measures from the part of the government health authorities, newly emerging epidemics lead to a threatening situation each year. Homoeopathy always played its part in such circumstances and the role of both government and private doctors in those situations was really commendable.

As Homoeopathic system has a unique method of finding out the preventive medicine by selection of genus epidemicus (GE) on the basis of collective symptomatology (including pathology) of the patients, there is always a hope even in newly emerging epidemics. This is an attempt to find out a GE for the current viral epidemic encephalitis.

IDENTIFICATION OF GE, STEP 1 – COLLECTION OF SYMPTOMS FROM PATIENTS.
As direct interaction with the patient was not allowed, information about the patient’s symptoms were obtained from patients caregivers, treating physician and literature on Nipah epidemic in past.

SYMPTOMS COLLECTED FROM PATIENTS:

1. High fever
2. Violent headache.
3. Fear of death. (Due to knowledge about the mortality of the disease?)
4. Body pain. (Muscle pain?)
5. Vomiting. (H/o Gastritis?)
6. Weakness.
7. Scanty urine. (Retention? Suppression?)
8. Confusion, disorientation. (Time?, Place?)
9. Delirium, fever during
10. Heat, alternating with chill.
11. Convulsions 12. Coma.

PATHOLOGICAL – FROM REPORTS:

1. Encephalitis
2. Myocarditis
3. Vasculitis

IDENTIFICATION OF GE, STEP 2 – FINDING OUT A PROBABLE SIMILIMUM FOR THE SYMPTOMS.

REPERTORISATION:
RUBRICS:

1. Fever, Zymotic fevers.
2. Fever, Heat, Intense heat.
3. Headache, violent, fever during.
4. Mind, coma, fever during.
5. Mind, Delirium, fever during.
6. Fever, Heat, alternating with chill.
7. Urine, scanty, fever during.
8. Convulsions, fever during.
9. Weakness, fever during.

REPERTORIAL RESULT:

Ars: 24/9
Bell: 20/9
Lyc: 17/9
Rhus tox: 20/8,
Hyos: 18/8,
Bapt: 17/8,
Bry: 17/8,
Nat-mur: 17/8,
Puls: 17/8,
Nux vom: 16/8,
Arn: 15/8
Phos: 15/8

PATHOLOGICAL CONSIDERATION:

1. Encephalitis: Ars1 Bell3
2. Carditis: Ars2, Bell2, Lyc2
3. Vasculitis: Ars3, Bell2

Ars and Bell are the Final medicines.

DIFFERENTIATION OF THE FINAL MEDICINES:

Plus points for Bell.

1. First grade medicine in Inflammation of brain. Ars only 1 mark.
2. Bell is the only medicine (1 mark)under the rubric ‘retention of urine, with congestion of brain’
3. Previous successful h/o prophylactic use against encephalitis (JE)
4. Bell is found effective against viral encephalitis (JE) in some in vitro studies too.

Plus points for Ars

1. Main medicine for fever with weakness out of proportion to the disease.

FINALLY SELECTED MEDICINE: BELLADONNA.
PROPOSED DOSAGE:

Day 1 to 5: Bell 200/bd
From Day 6 onwards 1 dose of bell 200 every 3rd day until the epidemic subsides.
1 dose = 2 Number 40 medicated pills

SPECIAL ADVISES:

Any person who is taking the medicine should stop the medication if any adverse symptoms appear.
Since the GE is only a proposed medication, any person who is on GE should follow the protocol on fever proposed by the health authorities. The GE offers no guarantee but there is chance for prevention (provided that the individual is not already infected) as observed in earlier preventive medicine study examples.
Informed consent should be obtained before giving the GE.

CONCLUSION:

Since the current infection has almost 100 percent case fatality rate and as there is no available treatment except supportive care, we propose this homoeopathic GE for administration to contain the epidemic. GE is a time tested Homoeopathic method of prevention of epidemic and has yielded positive outcome in many previous epidemics.

REFERENCES:

1. National guideline for management, prevention and control of Nipah virus infection, including encephalitis. Directorate general of health services, Ministry of Health and Family welfare, Govt. of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh.
2. JE, Homeoprophylaxis in India. Dr Srinivasulu Gadugu & Prof. Shailendra K Saxena.
3. Complete dynamics in Homoeopathy – Eduard Van Grinsven
4. Organon of Medicine – Samuel Hahnemann.
5. Decreased intensity of Japanese encephalitis virus infection in chick chorioallantoic membrane under influence of ultradiluted Belladonna extract. – Bandyopadhyay B, Das S, Sengupta M, Saha C, Das KC, Sarkar D, et al.
6. Suckling mice of “Belladonna 200” fed mothers evade virulent Nakayama strain Japanese encephalitis virus infection. Int J Microbiol Res 2011;2;252-7.
7. Evolution of homoeopathic medicines as add-on to institutional management protocol in Acute encephalitis syndrome. – Raj.K.Manchanda , Praveen Oberai et al.