Homeopathic Teething Remedies: Do they work?

All parents of young children know that teething is no fun for the baby or the parents. My little guy is 10 months old and has been teething on and off since he was about 5 months.

One of the things that has been recommended to me many times are homeopathic teething tablets or drops such as Hyland’s.  People swear  it is the ONLY thing that worked for their kid.  They say that they are “all natural” and “completely safe” so there is no harm in trying them! Well, I’ve done some research on homeopathy and yes, homeopathic remedies are completely safe, but it is doubtful that they actually work.

Homeopathic products often get lumped in with natural or herbal products. This confusion is completely understandable. Homeopathic products are marketed that way and are sold next to herbal products and vitamins on store shelves, but homeopathy is a distinct and specific form of alternative medicine.

What is Homeopathy?

Homeopathy was developed in the late 1700s or early 1800s by Samuel Hahnemann and is based on two main principals:

The law of similars or “like cures like”

The law of infinitesimals or minimal dose

The law of similars states that a disease can be cured by administering a substance that causes similar symptoms in a healthy person.

The National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) explains it like this:

The principle of similars (or “like cures like”) states that a disease can be cured by a substance that produces similar symptoms in healthy people. This idea, which can be traced back to Hippocrates, was further developed by Hahnemann after he repeatedly ingested cinchona bark, a popular treatment for malaria, and found that he developed the symptoms of the disease. Hahnemann theorized that if a substance could cause disease symptoms in a healthy person, small amounts could cure a sick person who had similar symptoms.

Abchomeopathy.com uses this example:

For example, if the symptoms of your cold are similar to poisoning by mercury, then mercury would be your homeopathic remedy.

By that logic, if I’m having trouble sleeping I should drink a very small dose of caffeine. I’m just sayin’.

In Hahnemann’s defense, he developed his principal at a time when the predominate medical theory was to “balance the body’s humors” by treating a disease with its opposite which included letting out the offensive matter causing the illness by bloodletting, purging or enemas. His law of similars was at least partly a reaction to these horrifying and harmful practices. The thing is that when people got more information about how the body and the world work, bloodletting was abandoned in favor of a more effective and provable system.  But homeopathy continues to use the law of similars even though there is no conclusive evidence that it is effective or even plausible.

The law of infinitesimals states that the smaller the dose of the medication, the more effective it will be.

Again NCCAM explains it like this:

The principle of dilutions (or “law of minimum dose”) states that the lower the dose of the medication, the greater its effectiveness. In homeopathy, substances are diluted in a stepwise fashion and shaken vigorously between each dilution. This process, referred to as “potentization,” is believed to transmit some form of information or energy from the original substance to the final diluted remedy. Most homeopathic remedies are so dilute that no molecules of the healing substance remain; however, in homeopathy, it is believed that the substance has left its imprint or “essence,” which stimulates the body to heal itself (this theory is called the “memory of water”).

ABC Homeopathy explains it like this:

Minimal Dose
The remedy is taken in an extremely dilute form; normally one part of the remedy to around 1,000,000,000,000 parts of water.

That’s a trillion! That’s a whole lot. That is so much that the likelihood of there even being one molecule of the substance left in the remedy in your bottle is next to zero.

The “law of minimal dose” contradicts the laws of chemistry, physics (yes, even quantum physics) and, in my opinion, common sense. By this logic, the less alcohol you drink, the more drunk you should feel. (This isn’t an actual claim made by homeopaths, but I’m using it to illustrate the point.)

As NCCAM states above, homeopaths believe that the healing substance leaves its imprint or essence in the water and that the water has a memory of the substance. As of now there is no plausible explanation of how this can happen.  Even if water does have a memory, how does the water know to keep the memory of that particular substance and not all the other stuff (urine, fish spawn, etc.) that has been in it before?  Let’s say that homeopaths have a way to purify or flush the memory of the water, how does the water know not to remember the essence of the container that they shake it up in?

Even the NCCAM acknowledges that homeopathy is inconsistent with established laws of science:

Homeopathy is a controversial area of CAM because a number of its key concepts are not consistent with established laws of science (particularly chemistry and physics). Critics think it is implausible that a remedy containing a miniscule amount of an active ingredient (sometimes not a single molecule of the original compound) can have any biological effect—beneficial or otherwise.

I agree that if a remedy is truly homeopathic then it is safe and will have no harmful side effects. The problem is that it will have no positive effect either. Or at least no effect beyond that of a placebo.

From NCCAM:

Most analyses of the research on homeopathy have concluded that there is little evidence to support homeopathy as an effective treatment for any specific condition, and that many of the studies have been flawed. However, there are some individual observational studies, randomized placebo-controlled trials, and laboratory research that report positive effects or unique physical and chemical properties of homeopathic remedies.

From Wikipedia:

Health organizations such as the UK’s National Health Service,[121] the American Medical Association,[11] and the FASEB[103] have issued statements of their conclusion that there is no convincing scientific evidence to support the use of homeopathic treatments in medicine.

From Pub Med:

CONCLUSIONS: The findings of currently available Cochrane reviews of studies of homeopathy do not show that homeopathic medicines have effects beyond placebo.

Teething

Whenever Duncan seems to be in a lot of pain from teething I give him some infant Tylenol or Motrin and that seems to help, but if you are looking to avoid these medications there are plenty of other things you can try.

Remedies seem to fall into two broad categories: 1) cold things to chew on and 2) various textures to chew on.

In the first category there are any number of teething rings that you can put in the freezer.  I’ve also heard of people freezing bagels, carrots and pieces of fruit for the little ones to chew on. I know it sounds a little gross, but my son likes to chew on an ice cube wrapped in a clean washcloth.

In the second category, my son loves the Wee Play Hand and Foot Teether. You can also try plush toys or wooden teething rings.

Teething is no fun and all we can do is try and help our babies be more comfortable as they go through it. If you still have some of those homeopathic teething drops in your medicine cabinet, I recommend freezing them into an ice cube, wrapping a washcloth around it and letting your kid chew on it. That is the best use of a homeopathic remedy.

If you would like to learn more about homeopathy, here are some good articles and videos:

http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=2785985155605802136&q=James+Randi#

http://www.acsh.org/healthissues/newsID.632/healthissue_detail.asp

http://www.skepdic.com/homeo.html#why