When I was still a homeopathic student, I would sometimes hear my teachers use the phrase “lost to follow-up”. It always puzzled me.
Why would a patient put in the time and considerable money to see a homeopath and then not follow up with them?
Why would a homeopath put all the effort into taking a first case, spend hours on end figuring out a remedy, and then not do everything in their power to get that patient back into their office to figure out what happened?
Sadly, however, 22 years later, I, too, have patients who are “lost to follow-up”.
From the patient’s perspective, there are a few common reasons why this happens:
- The remedy has done nothing.
- The remedy has made my condition worse.
- The remedy has worked beautifully, and I don’t need you any more
Here are my responses as a practitioner:
1. The remedy has done nothing.
In fact, people often forget how bad they were feeling when they first came in. Pain comes and goes and we forget it. It’s human nature. We all know the oft-repeated saying around childbirth: “If many women remembered the pain, they would never go through it again.” The same is true of all suffering.
One of the reasons why I type out everything you say to me in an appointment is so I can feed those words back to you in your follow-up. This is a good indicator of any change that has occurred.
My job as a classical homeopath (someone who prescribes only one remedy at a time) is to study, in depth, the effects of each of those substances I give my patients and to able to interpret the results accordingly.
If, in fact, the remedy has done nothing, I want to figure out why – any factors that might have antidoted its action – or to find a closer match to your state.
Your report of what has happened in the month that has gone by will tell me where I need to go next – repeat the remedy, give it in a different potency or form, or to change the prescription entirely.
2. The remedy has made my condition worse
In this case, the remedy is very often acting, and may, again, need to be modified. Another possibility is that the worsening is, in fact, pointing the way to a far more appropriate remedy for you.
3. The remedy has worked beautifully and I don’t need you any more.
Fabulous! I need to know this too.
Studying your response to the remedy lets me know where I would go if you need help in any other area of your life and if not now, in the future.
If you are considering not returning for your follow – up, please think again. You owe it to yourself.
And for all those patients who are “lost to follow-up”, it is never too late to come back and try again.
