What is the difference between homeopathy and conventional medicine?

Homeopathy is a holistic medicine, as it treats the whole person. It does so by giving a single remedy that acts most similarly to the person’s overall state of illness as expressed by the totality of mental, emotional and physical symptoms. The person’s overall state of health, and thus the symptoms experienced, are the result of an imbalance of the life energy. Since the homeopathic remedy is given for the sake of treating the person’s overall state of health—the life energy—each person requires a remedy that is suitable for his or her own unique state of illness. No two people are alike, thus each person is treated as a unique case. Since we are treating the life energy, energetic medicines that are highly dilute, nontoxic, and very powerful, are given. Homeopathy is concerned about the person and the entirety of his or her discomfort, not with specific diseases or conditions.

Conventional medicine is the exact opposite of the homeopathic approach. Conventional medicine views disease as an alteration in an organ or physiological system. It uses drugs specifically intended for the symptoms and diseases found in these organs and systems. Because conventional drugs are produced for the sake of treating specific diseases, the treatment each person gets is apt to be the same as any other person who has the same disease. People are not seen as having unique states of illness, but rather as being infected with common diseases. Using drugs that are often toxic to the body and therefore cause side effects, conventional medicine is concerned about specific diseases located in certain parts, not the person as a single suffering individual.