The 4th Sarla Sonawala Memorial Seminar January 1998-A Report
NATIONAL JOURNAL OF HOMOEOPATHY 1998 Jan / Feb VOL VII NO 1.
Reported by
Dr Nina H Doshi
The trend setting, 4th Sarla Sonawala Memorial Seminar, amalgamating modern clinical medicine and the Homoeopathic approach and its usefulness in skin and respiratory disorders, was held on 25th and 26th January 1998 at the Tata Memorial Hospital Mumbai. The following is the brief report
Day 1
The morning session saw Dr Hema Jayrajani - a leading dermatologist of Mumbai, enthrall us with unusual skin slides and useful clinical tips to recognize certain skin disorders. As Homoeopaths, we sometimes sideline the importance of diagnosing a skin disorder and just give importance to the nature of disease, the kind of eruption, the discharges, etc. But in today's fast changing world, we need to authenticate our cures by incorporating all available data. Just curing white spots is not sufficient; one has to classify these into leucodermatous patches, patches due to leprosy, or due to zinc deficiencies. An interesting highlight of the talk was that many times allopathic drugs also act as causative factors in so many skin conditions. She demonstrated her talk with slides on urticaria, purpura, ulcers, fixed drug reaction, blisters, lichenified drug eruption, acne form of eruption, keloid, contact dermatitis, atopic dermatitis, hyperkeratosis, alopecia, genital ulcer disease, venereal warts, oral candida, pigmentary changes etc.
Dr Vishpala demonstrated with wonderful visual aids, her exposition on AN APPROACH TO SKIN DISEASES. The first slide itself gave an indication of the innovative slides, which were to follow.
She said that to approach a skin case scientifically, you have to categorize it into:
- Function affected
- Diagnosis
- Miasm predominant : each of these were then discussed in detail. And practical demonstration given through an actual case.
- Importance of Examination: a case treated without looding at the lesion in seborrhic dermatitis refused to respond for 2 weeks by telephonic consultation. On examination it was found to be cold to touch and darkish hue: Secale-cor cleared it up.
- On importance of causation: Lady came with darkening of the skin, dating to severe diarrhoea 2 yrs ago. Veratrum-alb brought her glow back.
- On Choosing the correct salt of a remedy: A widow, widowed in 1 yr of her marriage. Though 40 yrs aga, yet her remedy was Mag. Carb and Mur had no effect, but Mag-sul 30 -1 dose cleared uyp her fungal infection of the waist Here the diagnostic label helped selection.
- All these live examples made the entire presentation lucid and gripping. And emphasised that visual aids make a permanent impact in the learning process.
Dr Rama Marathe spoke on ATOPIC DERMATITIS with cases.
[Visuals demonstrating efficacy of treatment should be made compulsory in a seminar of this nature. Otherwise prescriptions become like reading from journals.]
Dr Kasim Chimthanawala's talk was a perfect foil to the slide demonstration by Dr Hema. He presented the use of certain specific remedies for specific skin conditions with pictorial slides.
Day 2
Dr Nilesh Baxi commenced the proceedings by taking us through an informative capsule on ALLERGY, speaking on its pathophysiology, investigations and elaborated at length on respiratory allergic disorders like asthma. Live demonstration of the use of PEFR and other tests to determine the lung function like blowing into an air pillow, the candle test etc made it more audience- interactive.
Dr Praveen Kumar talked on ALLERGIC RHINITIS, ITS THERAPEUTICS AND STATISTICS on treatment and its success. His talk was interspersed with quick repartees and humour.
Dr Jaiswal gave a wonderful talk incorporating PHILOSOPHY AND MATERIA MEDICA WITH CASES ON GENERAL SKIN CONDITIONS.
In the post-lunch session, Dr Nina Doshi presented a novel way of understanding REMEDY IMAGES THROUGH CARTOON CHARACTERS and their behaviour in familiar comic strips along with clinical presentation of the remedy image. Translation of patient's behaviour into rubric totality is always difficult. With colourful slides of cartoon characters and comics; this, she averred, is one way of making the process of understanding various remedies innovative and enjoyable.
Dr Asrani made an excellent slide presentation on the burning topic of the day -AIDS. He cleared many misconcptions and gave good practical tips on how to deal with HIV +ve patients and their relatives and suggested using auto transfusion of blood in planned surgeries.
Dr Vishpala concluded the seminar with her audiovisual presentation of INTERPRETATION OF HOMOEOPATHY IN LIGHT OF MODERN MEDICINE. THIS HIGHLIGHTED HOW important it is to keep investigative parameters in mind whicle treating difficult cases lide Diabetes, Cirrhosis, Calculi etc.
Finally a panel dicussion made the participant leave with a feeling of belonging.
The NJH staff members need to be lauded for their untiring efforts to make all facilities available to the delegates. The two days of networking and learning was enjoyed greatly by all.
