The workshop focused on validating homeopathic drugs using modern statistical tools. It was led by Dr. Lex Rutten from the Netherlands. He discussed using prognostic factor research and statistics to validate characteristics in homeopathic materia medica and repertories. This could form the basis of an expert system to help practitioners differentiate between homeopathic medicines. Dr. Rutten also emphasized the need for improved collection and analysis of data from shared successful homeopathic cases to better understand symptom indications.

1. A report by
Dr Amrit Kalsi
MD(Hom)
Chief Medical Officer(H)

2. The workshop was organized by Central Council Of Research in
Homeopathy , Ministry of AYUSH, Govt. of India,on 16 th and 17th
February, 2015 in AYUSH auditorium at CCRH headquarters,
Janakpuri. There were around 70 delegates. Two doctors from our
department were nominated to attend the workshop Dr. Amrit
Kalsi, CMO and Dr. Anjali Miglani, SMO. This workshop with Dr
Lex Rutten, M.D., (Nehterlands) focused on the importance of
validation of homeopathic drugs in the light of modern statistical
tools. It was to sensitize the audience about drug validation through
latest statistical tools and techniques.

3.  After the felicitations and lamp lighting welcome address
was given by Dr RK Manchanda, Director General,CCRH
followed by keynote address by Padamshree Dr. V K
Gupta . The chief guest , Shri A. K. Ganeriwala, Joint
secretary (AYUSH) appreciated the efforts of the
Homoeopathic world for continued medical education and
updating their knowledge through such workshops. The
audience was addressed by Dr Lex Rutten who gave a brief
about his commendable work in drug validation and the
topics he would cover during the workshop. Dr Anil
Khurana , Deputy Director(H) CCRH gave the vote of
thanks.

6. Dr Lex Rutten, M.D. (Netherlands)
 Born 1950. Medical doctor since 1977, general
practitioner 1978-1983, homeopathic doctor since 1979,
since 1983 homeopathic consultant. Studied
homeopathy in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany,
Greece, UK. Additional training in statistics and
diagnosis/prognosis research.
 Main research topic: personal characteristics as
prognostic factors, the relationship between a
characteristic and effect of a specific medicine.

8. Few of his Research articles
discussed in workshop
 Rutten LA, Stolper EC. Complementary alternative
medicine, plausibility and statistics. Eur J Intern Med. 2014
Jul 30. pii: S0953-6205(14)00204-0. doi:
10.1016/j.ejim.2014.07.004. [Epub ahead of print] PubMed
PMID: 25085058.
 Rutten LA. The importance of case histories for accepting
and improving homeopathy. Complement Ther Med. 2013
Dec;21(6):565-70. doi: 10.1016/j.ctim.2013.10.001. PubMed
PMID:24280462
 Rutten LA, Frei H. Frequently occurring polar symptoms
assessed by successful cases. Homeopathy. 2012
Apr;101(2):103-11. PubMed PMID: 22487370

9.  Rutten AL, Frei H. Opposite repertory-rubrics in Bayesian perspective.
Homeopathy. 2010 Apr;99(2):113-8. PubMed PMID: 20471614
 Rutten AL. How can we change beliefs? A Bayesian perspective.
Homeopathy. 2008 Oct;97(4):214-9. PubMed PMID: 19371571.
 Rutten AL, Stolper CF, Lugten RF, Barthels RW. New repertory, new
considerations. Homeopathy. 2008 Jan;97(1):16-21. PubMed PMID:
18194761.
 Rutten AL. Bayesian homeopathy: talking normal again. Homeopathy.
2007 Apr;96(2):120-4. Review. PubMed PMID: 17437940.
 Rutten AL, Stolper CF, Lugten RF, Barthels RW. A Bayesian perspective
on the reliability of homeopathic repertories. Homeopathy. 2006
Apr;95(2):88-93. PubMed PMID: 16569624.
 Rutten AL, Stolper CF, Lugten RF, Barthels RW. Repertory and the
symptom loquacity: some results from a pilot study on likelihood ratio.
Homeopathy. 2004 Oct;93(4):190-2. PubMed PMID: 15532697.
 Rutten AL, Stolper CF, Lugten RF, Barthels RW. Repertory and
likelihood ratio: time for structural changes. Homeopathy. 2004
Jul;93(3):120-4. Review. PubMed PMID: 15287430.

11. With reference to his papers the following topics were covered:
•Assessment of homeopathic symptoms: prognostic factor
research
•Statistics and homeopathy
•article ‘Data collection, Treat every variable as a treasure
•Assessment of keynote symptoms
•New repertory, new considerations
•Assessment of Polar Symptoms
•A Bayesian perspective on the reliability of homeopathic
repertories.
•Repertory and likelihood ratio: time for structural changes.

13. He proposed Personalised medicine sounds familiar to homeopathic
materia medica and repertories . These could be considered as
prognostic factors. At the moment, knowledge about ‘personalised
homeopathy’,stored in our materia medica and repertories, is based on
expert opinion. It therefore seems logical to apply the novel concepts
of prognosis research to homeopathy.
In homeopathy, repertorisation of the characteristics of the patient
constitutes a prognostic model:a table with the selected characteristics
and a number of medicines to be considered based on the
combination of characteristics.Prognosis research opens the way to
hypothesis-free studies to discover relevant prognostic factors. Such
studies investigate the association of large numbers of personal
characteristics or genetic variants with outcome.

14. Further he said Such a prognostic model could be the basis of
an expert system which would enable patients or doctors with
little knowledge of homeopathy to differentiate between several
homeopathic medicines. He further said thousands of shared
successful cases render misleading information because they
are not properly analysed. A symptom seen in a successful case
is hitherto regarded an indication for the prescribed medicine,
but Bayes’ theorem tells us that this is a mistake: the prevalence
of the symptom should be higher in the ‐population that
responds well to the medicine than in the remainder of the
population.
He also emphasized that the importance of data collection for
homeopathy is obvious, so we should try to speed up the process
of software development for homeopathic data collection.

15. Dr Amrit Kalsi
MD(Hom)
Chief Medical Officer(H)
Dte. Of AYUSH, Govt of NCT of Delhi