Consultations may reduce anxiety which worsens pain perceptions OR clients may like the consultation atmosphere, need the human interaction, and be grateful for the concern and consequently rate the treatments as effective out of gratitude for the attention and concern for the practitioner. One hand “washing” the other, perhaps on a subconscious level.

Treating the patient. What a revolutionary idea. For years medical doctors have been taught the illness is the only thing of importance. Patients are only containers for the disease and of little concern. The best doctors have always been the ones who consider the patient first. Things might be improving.

How did you spin this story into a positive look at homeopathy? The study abstract specifically says that homeopathic remedies do not help with arthritis, and yet your first line, “homeopathy can significantly reduce the symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis”, is false since it implies to readers that the medicines work, when all that was at play was the placebo effect from longer consults. And it’s always insulting to allopathic doctors to hear the tired refrain “conventional doctors tend to treat the illness”. Homeopathy remains a scientifically implausible medicine, and this study is far from a validation of homeopathy; it’s a validation of tender loving care and the subsequent placebo effect, which could be gained from any type of caregiver.

Can’t agree more with Richard Saint Cyr: if anything this study shows that the homeopathic medicine does NOT work; for all of those that have only a vague understanding of how homeopathic medicine supposedly works, please check out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homeopathy
I can’t believe that this report now spins the story to say that: “Homeopathy shows clinical benefits for rheumatoid arthritis patients…”
Please – anyone – reconcile for me what Wikepedia says on homeopathy with this reported effectiveness…

You can choose any number of attitudes toward homeopathy and this article. However, it should give those of us who are not homeopaths something to think about when it comes to our initial consultations, attitudes toward our patients’ problems and how we “treat” them. If, indeed, homeopaths have figured out a consultation SO powerful that it gives clinically discernible results above and beyond the usual Hawthorne-type effect, then we all have something to learn!

NW, I don’t think homeopaths have “discovered” a uniquely powerful consultation; I think the only major difference is that homeopaths spend a lot more time per patient than an allopathic doctor, often up to an hour per consult. There’s no substitute for a good history and hands-on physical.

That suggests that primary care may need to focus more on more holistic care, with more nursing consults/followups perhaps, in between doctor visits.

This article does not seem to be very thoroughor well edited, so it has left me with more questions than answers. Perhaps the length of your articles allows little depth.

I do wonder why Europeans use homeopathy. They are certainly no less educated than us, nor do their MDs seem less trained than ours; yet, my friends from Europe often use homeopathy, as well as herbal and allopathic healing modalities. It appears we all have much to learn from each other.