Wise Woman Health
Cost
There are as many cost structures as there are Homeopaths. Options I offer are below.
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It is good for us all when people strengthen our immune systems through this care. it can be thought of as a sustainable community support model; if I am stronger I am less likely to contract disease, or may move through it quickly, and then I am less likely to pass it on to others who may have less robust immune systems.
Chronic care, also referred to as Constitutional care, is a process and just one appointment, while it might result in some relief, is not likely to result in longterm resolution of susceptibilities.
$300 Initial 2 hour appt. followed by study of your case ** remedy included if I have it in my pharmacy
$125 for Followup appts.
Followups require considerable time, thought, and research beyond the appointment time, as well as creating good tracking notes to be used in future appointments. I book in 60 minutes for Followups though it's possible we may not need that long together. Even if everything is on a good trajectory we need these Followups (in the beginning, usually 4 or 5 weeks apart and often spread out further after the first two or three appointments) to track changes you might not even have on your mind; these give me a lot of information about how the remedy is working, whether it is appropriate to move into another potency, or whether you have moved into another remedy state over time.
We use the information along the way to develop a clear picture of how you are functioning now in comparison with how you were when first we met.
Too often when patients feel better they don't bother coming in for Followups and they start to slip back to original symptoms and think that Homeopathy does not work. But when there is slipback, we need to track that as it helps guide us to a good potency and frequency of dose for you. We're tracking a lot with these appointments, and they are important to your homeopathic healthcare.
People who attend a series of Followup appointments with their Homeopath tend to have better longterm outcomes. Your serious symptoms may have developed over decades; it takes time to have sustained deep improvement.
A true Acute Care appt. is $125. Though we may talk only 15 to 25 minutes when you call for the Acute, in most cases I will spend time after the call to study the case, sometimes will email or call to clarify a few more things, and will return your call quickly with a prescription. We will follow up during that week and in a true Acute it is common for people to pass into different remedy states within days so that a different remedy may be required. That care will not be charged separately.
When you are paying a Classical Homeopath, you are paying primarily for Labor, though one of the benefits of how I work is that I have put many thousands of dollars into filling out my personal pharmacy with hundreds of remedies in multiple potencies from the best quality labs I know based on direct experience with them since the mid-90's, and consultation with multiple longtime Homeopaths. Having invested in a large personal pharmacy is part of my commitment to you.
** Please let me know who will pick up your remedy for you when you are not able
You cannot walk into the Hahnemann Labs Pharmacy in San Rafael, California; it is not set up to be able to serve people in person. While I include in my rates the cost of remedies I have in my stock, if the remedy needs to be ordered, I will call in the remedy order for you. You will call the pharmacy (open M-F only) and pay by credit card and they will send your remedy to you. Please ask the labs to make a note to have your package left in a dry place. Remedies should not be left to get hot, or be left in damp areas.
My other primary homeopathic remedy suppliers are Helios Homeopathic Pharmacy, in England, and B. Jain Homeopathic Pharmacy, in India.
Focused Consultations (see page): $125 / hour
When people don't follow up after an initial appt., some are tempted to say Homeopathy doesn't work. We must follow you closely until which time your Vital Force has gotten the boost it needs to keep you on an even keel.
In our modern times things can get very confusing as we need to wade through a host of chemical exposures people face in their homes, neighborhoods, daycares, schools, and workplaces, while at the same time taking into account negative effects of Vaccinations, Birth Control, and other Pharmaceuticals, and the suppressive effects of Antibiotics, while also tracking other maintaining causes of disease, even the effects of cordless phones, cell phones, cell towers and antennas, and effects of WiFi, and mold in environments where you spend time. Additionally, we have to comb through the suppressive effects caused by over-the-counter drugs that are are prevalent around us, including for kids and teens.
All of this is part of Posology consideration. After the initial time period it is not uncommon to have to change the potency, frequency, or manner of dosing. You are paying for expertise and skill we have developed over many years of study and practice in considering myriad possibilities to determine what likely is best to help you.
Since we cannot know every incoming issue or exposure in your life, I encourage my patients to think about what they feel is affecting them. When I know more about your family's surroundings and inputs, and your family's known responses to them, I have the best possibility of helping you most deeply. Often, it is a process of unfolding. With more time, Patients tend to share more information and details which allow me to answer that question Hahnemann always asked: What Is To Be Cured?
The purpose of the Followups is for me to track your progress, anything good, or anything slipping, and we want to look for old symptoms from your past making an appearance, and anything that appears to be a new symptom showing up. We don't always have a way to know that what seems like a new symptom was not a symptom from your youth, or something you experienced as a baby, but if your parents are still with you, you might ask them if they remember a particular symptom which has come up for a brief appearance in the weeks following an appt.
We bring together all that we know about you from the initial appt. and look at what you have experienced since taking the remedy. You're not necessarily going to know why we are asking certain questions in a Followup, or all of what we're tracking (for lack of time to explain it all), but be assured that those questions help us to understand you through the homeopathic lens, and to see if there is a miasmatic layer which needs addressing for you to experience more help from your remedy. Upon occasion we will realize with some new information that, a different remedy is needed. It is likely to be one sharing many characteristics, and may be part of a family of remedies that included the original prescription, but if we see a closer match we may change your Rx after the Followup appt. to something which more closely matches your state.
There is deep science in Homeopathy, and Posology includes a lot of the art of Homeopathy in bringing together what we know about the patient and the likelihood that one potency or frequency is needed, or one way of giving the remedy is better than another for this patient (dry vs. in water; just one dose; weekly doses over a month; or many other methods), and we consider the pace of a particular remedy which helps us to decide when a Followup is needed; these decisions are part of the art.
I'm looking for the point at which you feel so improved that you return only when needed after the initial time period. We want to see you continuing on the positive trajectory of your life.
When I talk about Labor, this is where I describe what I call 'keynote prescribing' where there is a focus on one or two keynote symptoms. Someone takes the case quickly, sends you out the door with a different remedy in hand every time, and over the course of years you may be given a very long list of remedies. If you're feeling grief about a loved one's death, you might be offered Ignatia. If you have skin issues, Sulphur is likely to be suggested. It's not that those would harm you and after much consideration, in some cases those might be good matches, but in Classical prescribing we're not jumping to conclusions. We're considering all we understand about you as a person and bring all of that together with your chief complaint(s) to come to an appropriate Rx. In Homeopathy practiced classically we bring together mentals, emotionals, physicals, and the spiritual, when that comes up, to understand the whole of how you experience life.
While sometimes we have to prescribe in that 'keynotes' fashion, for instance when we are seeing people in free clinics for homeless people, seniors, or veterans where we literally don't have the time for a normal full intake, and because we have no idea when next we will see these patients, it's not ideal and that is not how I treat in my normal practice. And still, we keep careful notes at these clinics so that, over time we gather more information about each patient and can build upon that information to treat on a deeper level if, and when they return.
In theory Homeopathy is beautifully simple but in reality, the practice of Homeopathy requires many years of dedicated study and practice to obtain enduring results. We're hearing increasingly frequently about M.D.'s, N.D.'s, Osteopaths, Acupuncturists, Chiropractors, Dentists, and other practitioners saying they, "do Homeopathy, too." I have to question, when I hear this, what has been the quality of their studies? I cannot help wonder why they are prescribing rather than referring, as do Professional Homeopaths when it is appropriate. While I have some background in various modalities, I will suggest adjunct care for you from the professionals in their fields when I believe you would be helped by them. I'm not going to pull out my needles in your presence!
But because I have working knowledge based in certifications in Shiatsu and ancient Anma, and introductory CranioSacral Therapy, and Nutrition and Health coaching (CHC), and over decades have had help via many modalities including Chiropractic (multiple styles), Hellerwork, Acupuncture (modern and ancient styles) and Chinese herbs, Rebirthing Therapy, old style Osteopathy, old style Naturopathy and by an N.D., Physical Therapy to avoid going under the knife, Alexander Technique, and Reiki, Breema, and healthy Biological Dentistry as well as specialized Orthodonture, I can talk with you about these modalities and why one might choose a certain modality.
I've birthed my babies in a free-standing birth center, and at home with enormously skilled Lay Midwives and Doula help. I'm happy to help direct you to therapies or to modalities I believe will help beyond the help I will provide you through Classical Homeopathy.
If you embark on the study of Homeopathy, you will become aware of some keynote symptoms associated with remedies. It is important to think about those, but is equally important to realize that Classical prescribing is based on a significantly long appointment with the patient during which the Homeopath is trying to understand what makes that person tick, how she experiences life, how they react to challenges, what is characteristic about him, and their responses to bumps in the road, or even to tragedies.
If there is nerve pain, how does the patient experience and describe it? This information helps describe a person's 'remedy state' and helps in confirmation when we are considering a remedy for the patient. Our study doesn't end when you leave the office; taking the time to allow deep consideration of all aspects of the case is what distinguishes Classical Homeopathy practiced as Hahnemann taught his students. I have been trained to prescribe thoughtfully and deeply and will always do my best by you.
An Example : Two people can be involved in the same tragedy, for instance watching a bomb explode over a neighborhood. One person might be overcome with tremendous grief along with guilt that this happened to her but she was spared, while another might primarily feel fury and outrage, and want retribution. We are not judging the person's reaction, but looking at the very different central responses as remedy states, and we use those as a guide to finding a remedy whose profile would include that state.
The different remedies taken by those two people would help each of them come to more equilibrium and be able to cope with life after this tragedy. The reality would not be removed, but these people's responses would come toward less extremes. The person with so much guilt might be able to pull out of the overwhelmed state to find a beneficial way for her to respond, maybe joining a grief group set up to help people deal with the emotional effects of the experience. The one with so much fury might find a way to funnel that outrage into a productive outlet such as bringing together needed clothing and bedding for the ones who survived the bombing, and gathering their information in order to notify their kin of the situation, finding a way to help in the midst of grief.
Homeopaths look at such differing characteristic responses to make the remedy matches we do. If someone flipped in a situation like that bomb scene from giving a loud expression of outrage to sitting down and reading, seeming to block out others and dissociating from the situation, that would be something we would find important to consider in our homeopathic look at the person.
A Homeopath prescribing deeply will look for these kinds of details and so much more. We look at the timelines in your life, major events, what you feel needs help in your life, your family history, relationships in your life, health history, any pharmaceuticals in use, supplements you are taking, we discuss anything that feels important to you, and ask about other things which will help us come to a remedy choice. Sometimes after you have been on a good remedy for awhile, more issues will come up at a Followup appt.
Things that you practically did not think about suddenly may be important to you to bring up and will lay the way for understanding more about you, more deeply, and so this might help us come to a change in potency or an appropriate next prescription.
This process has been described as a dance between the patient and the Homeopath.
These initial appointments typically are 2 hours. People prescribing classically typically spend much time following an appt. Even Homeopaths in practice 30-40 years often spend hours in studying your case to make sure they have figured out a good answer to our eternal question: What Is To Be Cured?
Upon occasion it is obvious that there is a miasmatic state which will be helped with one out of a very few remedies and that remedy may be given right in the office, but the Homeopath will continue to study your case to consider what could be the underlying Constitutional state and at Followups she is determining whether that miasmatic layer appears to be cleared. At the appropriate point, she will be able to prescribe a good Chronic Care, or Constitutional, remedy.
This process is unique to the individual. There is no way to know ahead of time how long that part of the process will take but it, also, will bring relief. We have to understand you deeply as a human being, and understand how you cope with difficult situations in your life in order best to prioritize the information we are presented as we receive your case, to bring it together to get a strong picture of a remedy state. Your very words and descriptions will "give" us your remedy state.
Again, the experience is unique to each person we treat. And while many people experience the whole process as therapeutic, we are not providing therapy, per se; we are listening and learning about how you experience your life to help us in our prescribing.
Homeopaths do continual study of myriad Materia Medica and often spend long hours reading books on remedy groups when we feel we see that a patient will need, say, a Bird remedy, or a Compositae (sometimes called Asteraceae) family remedy. While Arnica, a Compositae family remedy would be likely to help a lot in almost any traumatic accident, if a person were kicked in the belly, or had her gall bladder removed, Bellis perennis, in the same family, could be a more particular match and if so would be likely to help her heal that much faster.
WHAT TO EXPECT WITH CHRONIC CARE, OR CONSTITUTIONAL, HOMEOPATHIC TREATMENT
We will meet as described above. I will ask that you give me about a week after our appt. as I consider and study my notes while I determine what absolutely must be reflected in the remedy, and what may or may not need to be seen in the remedy. I will look at which remedies share most of the central aspects I am considering in you. I will do a Materia Medica differential of 4 or 5 of what I think are the best possible choices and will settle on the one of those which will be the best fit for you. I will get that to you and once you take the remedy please let me know so I can note the date in your chart.
In many cases, we will have a 10-minute Followup phone call about a week after you have taken your remedy and will meet about a month after you take it (does not have to be exact dates!). After the Followup, I'll determine how well the remedy is working and has held, and based on that will plan either another dose, or doses, or no dose at that time as the remedy continues in its work, and that will determine when the next Followup should take place. Sometimes another appt. about 4 weeks later is useful. Or if things are going well, it might be 6 or even 8 weeks. At that Followup we again will track symptoms and look back at where things were at the initial appt. to have a clear comparison.
I put a lot of effort into supporting you so that we catch things before they slip too far back, in order to keep the overall trajectory moving forward. It's a little like retraining muscles when you improve your posture; you have to keep giving your body the message of what is healthy posture. It's the same here, only it is your Vital Force (like Chi, or Prana) which we are supporting and need to give these reminders. We are like Vital Force Whisperers!
Your Homeopath is a facilitator as you move toward health and freedom in your life but It is you doing the healing from the inside, out
