Atopy and Hering’s Law

This issue of Homeopathy features two studies of the treatment of atopic disease in children: from Eizayaga in Argentina and Rossi et al. in Italy.[ ^1,2 ] The subject is important: atopy is common and becoming more common worldwide, for reasons which are not entirely clear. Complementary medicine, particularly homeopathy, is frequently used for atopic conditions, and atopy is the paediatric condition most commonly treated with homeopathy. Eizayaga studied atopic dermatitis, Rossi, working in a public sector setting in Tuscany, looked at atopic conditions in general with a focus on the long-term outcomes of children with atopic dermatitis.

Both are observational outcomes studies and suffer from the weakness of such studies: they are uncontrolled and the influence of factors including regression to the mean, natural history of the disease, non-specific and placebo effects is unknown. However both sets of authors went to some lengths to follow up patients and Rossi et al. traced over 50% of their atopic dermatitis patients eight years later. In both cases the results were encouraging.

• References

• 1 Eizayaga J.E., Eizayaga J.I. Prospective observational study of 42 patients with atopic dermatitis treated with homeopathic medicines. Homeopathy 2012; 101: 21-27.
• 2 Rossi E., Bartoli P., Bianchi A., Da Frè M. Homeopathy in paediatric atopic diseases: long-term results in children with atopic dermatitis. Homeopathy 2012; 101: 13-20.
• 3 Zheng T., Yu J., Oh M.H., Zhu Z. The atopic march: progression from atopic dermatitis to allergic rhinitis and asthma. Allergy Asthma Immunol Res 2011; 3: 67-73.
• 4 Brien S., Harrison H., Daniels J., Lewith G. Monitoring improvement in health during homeopathic intervention. Development of an assessment tool based on Hering’s Law of cure: the Hering’s Law Assessment Tool (HELAT). Homeopathy 2012; 101: 28-37.