Today’s guest author comes from the United Arab Emirates, at gulfnews.com. You can read the original article here.
Adopt homoeopathy in mental health care
Dubai: A psychiatrist called upon the mental healthcare community to adopt homoeopathy as a tool to treat disorders, and move away from conventional medicine that can have severe side effects.
Speaking at the second conference on Integrative Medicine Conference on Thursday, organised by Dubai Healthcare City Authority’s Centre for Healthcare Planning and Quality (CPQ), Dr Vengalis Zafeiriou highlighted the benefits of integrating homoeopathy in psychiatric health care.
He said homoeopathy can reduce the duration of hospitalisation, quantity of the medicine needed, number of laboratory examinations, frequency of relapses, and the individual and state health care costs. This form of alternative medicine also improves overall health and helps all chronic diseases, excluding irreversible tissue damage; it has no side effects and can be successfully combined with any other kind of treatment, he said.
The conference, titled ‘Advances in Evidence Based Integrative Medicine, held under the patronage of Princess Haya Bint Hussain, chairperson of Dubai Healthcare City Authority, and wife of His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, aimed to bridge the gap between conventional, complementary and alternative medicine through evidence-based integrative medicine case studies.
Dr Zafeiriou, Psychiatrist and President and Director of Education of the Hellenic Association of Homoeopathic Medical Cooperation in Greece, provided case studies of patients suffering from alcoholism and autism.
After his lecture, he spoke to Gulf News about the need to lobby for homoeopathy in mental health care. “In psychiatry there aren’t any medicines designed to be curative, rather these relieve symptoms. Homeopathy can treat all kinds of disorders from anxiety and phobias to depression and schizophrenia. In mental hospitals, homoeopathy can treat patients with severe mental disorders, contributing considerably to the therapeutic outcome of conventional psychiatric treatment.”
Industry Insiders Speak
Gulf News also spoke to a few industry insiders on the subject. Dr Naseem Akhtar Qureshi, Director, Division of Research and Studies at the General Administration of Medical Research in Saudi Arabia said homoeopathy takes the stigma out of conventional mental health care. “Incorporating a homoeopathic unit in a psychiatric hospital will reduce the stigma associated with psychiatrists and mental hospitals. Homoeopathy will add another dimension to the holistic approach in the treatment of mentally ill patients. It will be a useful addition to the therapeutic arm of psychiatry.”
John Graham, Chiropractic Practitioner, Mezyad Medical Centre, Abu Dhabi said homoeopathy should become part of UAE mental health care services. “Homoeopathy has a place in psychiatric medicine. I truly believe that body, mind and spirit are interrelated – you cannot affect one without affecting the other.
Homeopathy helps everyone, be they people, animals or plants. It can also help every condition, whether it is physical, mental or emotional. Find out more here.