Dr G I Bidwells Advice At a Glance Bidwells
NATIONAL JOURNAL OF HOMOEOPATHY 1994 Nov / Dec Vol III No 6.
Pran Choudhary.
Repertory.
All in the Homoeopathic circle have read Dr. Glen Irving Bidwells "HOW TO USE REPERTORY" and have tried to follow his methods.
Dr. Bidwell suggests - "Take first the twenty-two rubrics and memorize the group of remedies found under each one, paying attention first to the generals. After becoming familiar with your list of remedies, learn the particular circumstances of the remedies under each rubric. This gives a ground work of the remedies that will be of use to you in your daily work of prescribing for your acute cases. After you have become familiar with the above symptoms you may broaden your knowledge of each remedy by reference to the Materia Medica. It has been my experience (as well as that of my students) that a few minutes study each day will soon give you a comprehensive knowledge of the remedies that will be in the shape of use at the bedside."
"Take, for example, a cold patient - one who is shivering with cold. Although covered by blankets, he cannot get warm. We find this patient having burning pains; he may be thirsty or not; there may be oedema of mucous membrane, with stinging pains. There may be scanty urine or any number of symptoms referring to a particular organ or to disease condition, which might lead you to think of Apis, but the fact that your patient was cold would rule out the remedy and turn your thoughts to a remedy found under the rubric; "Cold and aggravation from cold." Here you would find that one of the twenty-six remedies given would be one which would be homoeopathic to the patient in hand." "Take another example of a patient with throbbing pains. The first remedy which comes to mind for throbbing pain is Belladonna; but fourteen remedies in our list of forty have throbbing pains - Aconite, Calcarea-carb, Phosphorus, Pulsatilla and Sepia all have this characteristic pain in a high degree than poor overworked Belladonna. So see which one of the fourteen remedies is indicated by individualising more closely. If the throbbing pain was worse after midnight, of the ten remedies, only five remedies - Bryonia, Calcarea-carb, Phosphorus, Sulphur and Silicea cover this symptom. Then we learn that the patient is chilly, that the pains are worse from warmth, but that she desires very cold drinks. So we at once know that Phosphorus alone of the five remedies will be the one which the patient requires."
any such examples could be cited. To those who will look to this work for assistance they would not be necessary, and the student who begins to get a usable knowledge of our Materia Medica from this analysis will find that his learning of the remedies by this method will enable him to discriminate, individualize and differentiate his remedy and patient quickly, accurately and with an ease which will astonish him."
Dr. Bidwells list of remedies shows 39 instead of 40 but Pulsatilla and Secale-cor are also considered in some eliminating rubrics. So, I have added Pulsatilla and Secale-cor with four miasmatic remedies Medorrhinum, Psorinum, Syphillinum and Tuberculinum taking the total to 45 remedies which are listed for analysis in the chart shown here.
Each rubric is arranged in schematic and also alphabetic order according to Kents classification of grading (degree) of symptoms as - Mental generals, Physical generals and Particulars and also referred by Dr. Kents repertory except four rubrics out of the twenty two.
The rubric - Drinking, after aggravates - was numbered by Dr. Bidwell but was omitted in the original book and the character of pains like bursting, cramping, throbbing are also not found in Dr. Kents repertory. So, the above four rubrics are referred from Dr. Boenninghausens Therapeutic Pocket Book where remedies have been classified into five grades. For comparison of such rubrics Dr. Dhawales method is recommended.
Three extra columns have been arranged for the benefit of users of this chart.
- Sensitive to temperature - Dr. R.G. Millers predominantly hot and cold remedies have been extracted from Dr. tyler and Weirs repertorisation. It may help us to eliminate one group or a remedy on the patient being Hot blooded or Cold blooded.
- Miasmatic Relation - We know that all acute symptoms of the patient are the outer reflection of chronic diseases that arise form Chronic Miasms. Suffering diseases even acute manifestations, patient needs the dynamic as well as miasmatic remedy; otherwise the case will not cured. We can tally the patient with four miasmatic conditions - Anti-psoric, Anti-sycotic, Anti-syphillitic and Anti-tubercular remedies. It has been extracted from Dr. S.M. Gunavantes - Introduction to Homoeopathic Prescribing.
- Depth of Action - Duration of action of the remedy has been extracted from Dr. R.G. Millers Relationship of Remedies. It may be helpful for the second or subsequent prescription for the case under consideration.
