REVIEW ON SCHIZOPHRENIA CASES TREATED WITH HOMOEOPATHY

Authors

  • Bhuvaneswari Rajachandrasekar Research officer(Homoeopathy)/Scientist-2, Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry, National Homoeopathy Research Institute in Mental Health, Kottayam http://orcid.org/0000-0002-6259-7944
  • Dr Sakthivel vaiyapuri Post graduate scholar, Department of Psychiatry, National homoeopathy research institute in Mental Health, kottayam.

Abstract

Background: Schizophrenia is a chronic mental health disorder characterized by delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech or behaviour, and impaired cognitive ability. Schizophrenia is one of the top 25 leading causes of disability worldwide. Homeopathy places great emphasis on mental health, both for treating physical and mental illnesses as a whole. We examined literature related to the potential utility of homoeopathy in treatment of schizophrenia.

Aim and objectives: The purpose of this study is to find out how effective homoeopathy is in the management of schizophrenia and also to develop a strategy for future scientific research in homoeopathy.

Materials and Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted in the international search databases (PubMed, Medscape, Google Scholar, Wiley online library, Springer, Scopus) and AYUSH portal, all relevant reviews, research articles, case series, and case reports published until 2021. We searched all keywords related to schizophrenia, analysing the study design, methodology, homoeopathic medicine prescribed, and results.

Results and Discussion: Due to limited number of literature, during the search using keywords, out of these 11 studies only six studies were evaluated for their efficacy in managing schizophrenia. These Six studies are analysed on the basis of their study design, methodology; homoeopathic medicines that was prescribed, and the results. In all these studies individualised homoeopathic medicine was given based on totality of symptoms but no common pattern of potency is followed.

Conclusion: The review illustrates the positive role of homoeopathy in treatment of schizophrenia, as the studies didn’t include any control group, their positive results should be considered preliminary. A larger number of studies on strong evidence-based parameters, with rigorous study designs including RCTs with validated scales, are essentially required to be conducted to develop evidence base of homoeopathy for schizophrenia treatment.

Keywords: Homoeopathy, Schizophrenia, Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale (BPRS), Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS).

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Published

2022-10-04