Words: Dr Narayan C Deshpande Our digestive physiology, as a standard textbook puts it, is the component of ‘nutriture’ that provides the substances necessary to support bioenergetics. That is, the role of the digestive process is to prepare and separate individual nutrients from the complex food matrix that enters the body. This process begins with
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE One of my good, old teachers of clinical medicine would often articulate, in his impeccable Queen’s English, that the abdomen is a ‘temple of surprises.’ The abdomen is unquestionably a difficult-to-fathom ‘customer’ — it is not just the abdominal pain, or colic, which starts and ends that matters. The whole
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Bell’s palsy, as Johns Hopkins Medicine states, is an unexplained episode of facial muscle weakness, or paralysis. It begins suddenly and worsens over 48 hours. This condition may also emerge from damage to the facial nerve — the 7th cranial nerve. Pain and discomfort usually occur on one side of
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Twenty-six-year-old NK suffered from inveterate diarrhoea, triggered possibly by anxiety and stress, at the workplace, also home. She’s being treated for amoebiasis at a local clinic with no real benefit. I recommended a few lab tests and scan. There was nothing suggestive, or conclusive, from them. I determined clinically that
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE A 2014 report, published in The New England Journal of Medicine, was primarily intended to better inform doctors about obsessive-compulsive disorder [OCD]. The report quoted Dr Jon E Grant, MD, a psychiatrist at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Medicine, US, illustrating the case of a nineteen-year-old man who
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Q: My homeopathic doctor often tells me that homeopathy pioneered a host of ideas that are in vogue today and also celebrated for their wisdom. Could you please elaborate — with a few examples? — JK, New Delhi A: Homeopathy pioneered the research and treatment of allergies — to highlight
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Homeopathy uses small doses of ingredients, available in nature, to stimulate and assist the body’s natural ability to heal itself. Key Concepts Homeopathy employs natural remedies selected in accordance with the total symptom-picture of the patient. This will include not only external and internal symptoms, but also the individual’s lifestyle, emotional
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Q: Can homeopathic treatments be used alongside allopathic treatment; also, can we use homeopathy to self-treat at home? — JR, Bhubaneswar A: The old, or traditional homeopathic, view was they should not be used together, because homeopathy believes in the theory of suppression — through the use of certain conventional,
Words: Dr Narayan Deshpande You know it: gastroenteritis [GE], or stomach flu. This is an intestinal infection marked by diarrhoea, cramps, nausea, vomiting and fever. It is spread by contact with an infected person, and through contaminated food, water, or ‘touching’ a contaminated place. The incidence of GE cases, in India, is 10 million, every
Words: Dr Narayan C DESHPANDE Homeopathy is natural, holistic medicine. It is also, by far, the gentlest, the safest and benevolent form of medical treatment. It aims to treat the whole person rather than just the physical, or apparent, symptoms. Homeopathy is mind/body medicine. It looks at the — Connect betwixt the brain, mind, body,
