Hahnemann's Theory of Chronic diseases 

......... In the words of  Stuart Close MD

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     In formulating his "Theory of the Chronic Miasms," Hahnemann did for pathology what he had already done for therapeutics: he reduced a great mass of unsystematized data to order by making a classification based upon general principles.
     This classification of the phenomena of disease led to the broadest generalization in pathology and etiology that has ever been made, and greatly simplified and elucidated the whole subject.
     Hahnemann's generalization was based upon his new and far-reaching discovery: the existence of living, specific, infectious micro-organisms as the cause of the greater part of all true diseases,
     The history of the progress of natural history shows how men first approached nature; how the facts have been collected, and how these facts have been converted into science by successively broader and broader generalizations leading to the discovery of basic laws of nature.
     The work of Hahnemann in pathology may be compared to that of Cuvier in zoology, who reduced the entire animal kingdom to four fundamental classes, based upon the general characteristics of their internal structure: Vertebrates, Mollusks, Articulates and Radiates. Until Cuvier's time there was no great principle of classification. Facts were accumulated and more or less systematized, but they were not arranged according to law.
     Hahnemann reduced all the phenomena of chronic disease according to their causes to four fundamental classes, Occupational or drug diseases, Psora, Syphilis and Sycosis.
     Taking the entire mass of morbid phenomena, he first eliminated all of the numerous symptoms and so-called diseases which are merely local, temporary and functional, in persons otherwise healthy, due to non-specific causes, such as indiscretions in diet or regimen, mechanical injuries, undue exertions or indulgences, emotional excesses, etc. Such conditions are not true diseases, but mere indispositions, which disappear of themselves under ordinary circumstances when the cause is removed, or yield easily to corrective hygienic, dietetic, moral or mechanical measures. They ordinarily require no medicine. In this class of cases are included many of the so-called occupational diseases, caused by exposure of healthy persons to noxious influences incidental to environment or vocation, such as unsanitary dwellings, exposure to fumes and emanations from chemicals, absorption of minerals, such as lead or copper, etc.

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             This, the most fundamental and indispensable aspect of homeopathy is the most neglected part too. Most of us are taking this part of the theory of homeopathy, the most genuine theory on classification of disease ever proposed, so lightly  and lamenting on poor results that are coming out of half backed prescriptions.  Our teachers need to evolve better techniques to make the theory of Chronic disease more comprehensible to the students. The differentiation of diseases into various classes must be demonstrated practically and the application of the theory into practice and the advantages of strictly following the theory in practice must be stressed at every clinical setting. Hope men of medicine better understand the theory and put it into practice so that CURE is made possible.

            Dr Samuel Hahnemann deserved to be decorated with Nobel Prize for Medicine  either for his discovery of the LAW of SIMILAR or for the discovery of the THEORY of CHRONIC DISEASES.