Thursday, March 26, 2009

Principles of Dilution


The different forms of dilution:

1) Hahnemann's centesimal Dilution, where an active principle is diluted in 99 times its own volume of liquid, is potentiated to obtain a solution with a potency of 1CH. A drop of this solution is taken and diluted in 99 times its own volume of liquid and shaken: producing a solution with a potency of 2CH, and so on.

2) Hahnemann's decimal Dilution, where the active principle is diluted in 9 times its own volume of liquid, follows the same process, providing titrated solutions in DH.

3) Korsakov's Dilution: the process is the same, except that a single flask is used for the preparation. Instead of taking a hundredth of the solution obtained at 1CH, 99 per cent is discarded and the remaining 1 per cent diluted. At each new stage traces of the previous dilutions remain. This method would make it possible to obtain remedies which would have a more global effect than that obtained using Hahnemann's dilutions, and which would present fewer problems.

4) Quinquagentamillesimal Dilutions:

Historical overview -
In 1948, Dr Pierre Schmidt of Geneva and Dr Jost Künzli of St. Gallen put the finishing touches to the translation of the 6th edition of the "Organon of the Medical Art". Whilst they were translating this work, their attention was particularly attracted by § 270 on the subject of quinquagentamillesimal dilutions, which until that point had not been studied in depth.
In his § 270, Hahnemann describes very clearly the preparation method and also ways of administering quinquagentamillesimal dilutions (also known as fifty thousandths, or LM/... or Q...). He deals with the results of experiments and observations he has gathered over the course of the five years leading up to his last edition of the "Organon". In it, he describes a new method of potentiation that allows him to repeat doses of medication, sometimes over a very long period of time, particularly with chronic diseases, whilst avoiding the problems he has observed with centesimal dilutions.

Doctors Schmidt and Künzli decided in February 1949 to manufacture their own LM dilutions. Künzli would go on to make the remedy known as Sulfur on his own; later, with Pierre Schmidt, he would manufacture many other remedies, each of which would require about 30 hours' work.
Several other doctors of that time tried to manufacture LMs, none of them really followed the method of preparation described by Samuel Hahnemann. This inevitably gave rise to different remedies and therapeutic results that could not be compared.

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