What to expect
Your consultation
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There are two experts conferring in a homeopathic consultation: one is qualified in homeopathic medicine and the other is qualified in the ‘what, where, when and how’ of the patient – you. The point of the consultation is for us to work together to compile the most accurate ‘database’ of all aspects of your symptoms, enabling me to draw up a properly individualised prescription and treatment plan for your case.
With this in mind, please allow one to one-and-a-half hours for an initial consultation with an adult, and about an hour for a child. I will take more notes than you may be used to with a health practitioner, and I will ask a great variety of questions, some of which might strike you as odd, particularly if you are presenting with a physical ailment! This is because as well as looking at what you are presenting with, a homeopath needs to know about how you generally 'run'. So I will ask about things like:
Many people find that such an opportunity to take proper stock of their health and well-being is beneficial in itself, even before a prescription has been made. With the patient’s consent, and only when appropriate, I welcome further information or observations regarding their case from someone close to them, e.g. partner, parent, grandparent, other carer or health professional. Patients are also free to bring a supporter to their consultation, if needed. Consultations in a patient’s home are carried out on the understanding that the patient will have the privacy and the freedom to focus properly on their case, and interruptions, if necessary, will be minimal. When consulting with people under sixteen years of age I will expect to have someone present who is either a parent, or is the child’s primary carer. The only exceptions to this are where it might be more useful for a teenage child to consult alone, for some part or all of a consultation, and the parent or carer has given their consent for this to me directly. Where it is agreed to be useful and appropriate, and only with the patient’s or a parent’s/carer’s consent, I may make a brief examination of a physical symptom. After the consultation I continue to work on your behalf by checking through and synthesising the information compiled between us. I may briefly contact you again at this point, to clarify something, or to ask for a necessary piece of information not gained in the first consultation. Your prescription
Unless a remedy or another item needs to be specially ordered for you, you should receive your prescription within a week after your consultation. If there is any reason to stop me from fulfilling this timescale, I will tell you as soon as I know, and let you know when to expect the prescription. Depending on what is agreed between us, your prescription will either be sent by first class post, left for collection at the clinic you attended, or delivered directly to your address.
I usually supply remedies in the form of small pills to be dissolved under the tongue, but I may also supply a larger, softer, form of tablet, or powders, or liquid remedies and tinctures. Please follow carefully the instructions in your prescription packet re dosing, quantity and timing. If you have any doubt about these, or accidentally destroy, or even lose your remedy, contact me immediately. Depending on your presenting case, and your response and progress, you will need at least one follow-up appointment. These are usually spaced at four to six week intervals, but can be more or less frequent, as needed. The follow-up appointment is important: it is where patient and practitioner assess the response to the prescription so far and the patients progress and, all feed-back being taken into account, the prescription is left to stand, repeated, or altered appropriately. These appointments take approximately half the initial consultation time. |
“I am always quite apprehensive to lay all of my problems out on the table with 'strangers', but the atmosphere seemed so relaxed and instigating of trust that I had no problem doing so in this situation. It was very clear that I was speaking to someone who really knew her stuff and towards the end [of the consultation] we already had a pretty good idea of what might help and why. I left the consultation with an unusual sense of optimism and an eagerness to try out what Sandra decided to prescribe.” 
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