If book sales are any indication, Dr. Luc De Schepper is one of the most influential homeopathic doctors of our time. He has authored 12 books on homeopathy, acupuncture and holistic health care, including his latest, Achieving and Maintaining the Simillimum, which teaches the most difficult aspect of homeopathy - how to stay on the right course in the arduous road to curing a chronic patient.

Dr. Luc has medical licenses in Belgium and the United States; an Acupuncture license in Holland and California; and a Ph.D. in Acupuncture from the International Society of Acupuncture in Paris. Dr. Luc has received the Diploma of the British Institute of Homeopathy (D.I. Hom.) as well as the Certificate of the Hahnemann Academy of North America. He is fluent in four languages and is a renowned lecturer in the fields of acupuncture and homeopathy.

Dr. Luc is the founder of the Renaissance Institute of Classical Homeopathy in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He has seen over 200,000 patients in 29 years of practice, and in recent years has treated them exclusively with homeopathic remedies in LM potencies.

I first contacted Dr. Luc in May, 1994, when I bought some of his first homeopathic book on Musculoskeletal Healing. Now, after selling loads of his books each year, I contacted him by email with several questions.

GC: Dr. Luc, before we talk about your most recent books and activities, tell me how it is that a medical doctor, trained in Belgium, breaks out of conventional medicine first to Acupuncture, then to homeopathy, and now uses exclusively homeopathy with the lesser known LM potencies? What is the nature of the energy that has driven you from the beginning and led you through these stages to your present situation?

Dr. Luc: It took me only two months out of medical school to realize that "conventional" allopathic medicine was not going to be my cup of tea. As was the custom for every practitioner, I replaced a physician on vacation for 14 days. I saw the same patients on Mondays, another set on Tuesdays, the next set on Wednesdays, etc. While I appreciated the closeness with people during these house calls, I realized I was just prescribing their usual meds, taking their blood pressure and for the rest I was a welcome social diversion. Doomed with the prospect of falling into mental inertia, I went to a book store in Belgium, looked up alternative modalities, and was on my way the next month to Holland to the Dutch Doctor’s Acupuncture Society, a three year course in Amsterdam. Since I was equally close to Paris, my tubercular nature drove me to Paris at the same time to follow the French school. The rest is history. Already exposed to homeopathy at that time, I have never stopped studying even up till today.

GC: What is the biggest challenge you have had to overcome?

Dr. Luc: It certainly was not my doubts or the eagerness of my patients to have found an alternative. As usual it is the human Ego that creates jealousy and envy: "Why can he do something that I can’t do?" My increasing success in practice early on, raised loud dissenting voices of my colleagues who went so far as to threaten their patients to refuse to see them if they continued consulting me. It did not help: by the time I left Belgium in 1981 (getting married to an American citizen-that’s what women can do), I had one of the biggest practices in Belgium. At that point and now, my colleagues who used to call me a "quack" were pursuing studying alternative modalities themselves.

GC: I noticed in the July/August 1998 issue of Homeopathy Today, it was reported that you gave a benefit-seminar and raised over $14,000 for the National Center for Homeopathy. As well, you frequently travel, on your own, to help relieve the suffering of poor people in third world countries.

At first glance, these activities seem to be costing you a lot of time and money, but how would you describe their effect on your life and on the community?

Dr. Luc: Even before I entered medical school, I dreamed of making a difference for the poor in third world counties. Marriage and children postponed these desires but the moment I arrived at a point in my life that my children were taken care of, I could finally turn to what I cherish the most: offering help to those that never receive help. Besides donating money to the NCH, I organized another afternoon of introduction to homeopathy to my patients, raised another $15,000 and donated the money to build a clinic in a poor rural area in India. With just this amount of money, a clinic was build and operated for a whole year just on this budget. It stimulated me to get involved even more personally and I have made trips to South Africa and Kenya where I was teaching in several places and treating the poor in villages. Maybe it is little what I can achieve as an individual, but don’t say that to those whose grateful eyes will be forever in my heart. There is much to do, I have little money, but I tell my children, "I am deducting it from your inheritance!" After all, they are taken care of. I know that for the rest of my life, I want to dedicate my efforts to introduce homeopathy to third world countries, especially those that pharmaceutical companies have no interest in because the people are dirt poor! Fertile ground to introduce effective and cheap homeopathy!

GC: Over the years, would you care to share with us any experiences you have had with homeopathy and your personal health?

Dr. Luc: If I tell you that I can’t remember (and I have a great memory) when I took an allopathic drug even so much as an aspirin, then you know that my homeopathic kit is always at my side! For the most part, I needed it for my sport injuries since I play soccer, tennis, swim and practice yoga. But I certainly was challenged more seriously, when in 1992, I had a sudden bleeding in my right eye, making me instantly blind in that eye.

After a wrong diagnosis (with the promise I was going to be blind) and then an exact diagnosis of retinal bleeding, cause unknown, the good university professor told me to take 80 mgs daily of cortisone and see him back in one month’s time. I can assure you that it takes conviction not to give in to such allopathic suppression when your eye sight is at stake. But I chose the homeopathic simillimum above cortisone and restored my sight within one week. Upon consult with the famous professor, he did another retinogram (to view my vessels), he exclaimed, "It is a miracle," and never asked me if I took the cortisone or what I did. But I am sure he is using my case now to convince his medical students that his protocol "works!" If anything this convinced me that homeopathy as my true calling was and always will be the right choice!

GC: Can you recall for us your most memorable case, perhaps a case that will ingrain the value of homeopathy in our minds? Why did it move you so?

Dr. Luc: Among those 200,000 and plus cases, I could cite numerous cases that overjoyed me, moved me and earned me the respect and love of my patients. I loved seeing children, knowing how much their lives would be changed for the better. Don’t you think mothers were grateful when after 35 rounds of antibiotics in 5 years for ear infections, I managed in a couple of months to stop that recurrence forever? Just that would be enough for me to compensate me for all the hard labor in my life. Obviously there is the whole slew of ADD, ADHD, ODD, and "incorrectible dangerous" children that turned out to be normal after correction with the simillimum. One case that still sticks to my memory was the case of a 33 year old lady, who at age 19 had a head trauma, which lead to a series of serious delusions. They came to me after having seen 44 different doctors. I managed to cure her in about one year’s time. And what about those innumerable depressed cases, where I could give quality of life back? But most of all, in my thirty years of practice, I have met with my own number of failures, which made a far deeper impression on me than my successes. These failures were priceless experiences because they forced me to explore other views and modify my approach to find the simillimum for my patients. What I could not resolve five years ago, I can now. What I cannot resolve today, I hope to be able to unriddle tomorrow. The solution: continued study and dedication to mankind.

GC: Who is your favorite modern homeopath? Why?

Dr. Luc: There are few. Vithoulkas for his dedication and the suffering and personal attacks he had to go through. David Little for his studiousness and practicing true classical homeopathy for the poor in India for so many years. And Andre Saine for being a homeopath who also bases his practice on the application of our Laws and Principles and is not afraid to back it up with facts.

GC: Favorite 'old' homeopath? Why?

Dr. Luc: I have admiration for a lot more of the old masters. Hahnemann above all for obvious reasons; Hering for his dedication and unbiased observation which changed the face of homeopathy; von Boenninghausen for giving us a great analytical method, so little known among modern homeopaths; Adolph Lippe for being a staunch supporter of true homeopathic medicine; I love Elizabeth Hubbard, Margaret Tyler and Dorothy Shepherd, three female homeopaths, who always were practicing at the forefront of homeopathy. But Dr. Pierre Schmidt of Switzerland has a special place in my heart for his intelligence, his wide approach to other modalities and the numerous successes in his practice. He was first in his medical school, a proof that often homeopathy is mostly understandable to the most intelligent and flexible physicians. "Aude sapere," "Dare to know," is a credo every physician should follow! Pierre Schmidt was a star among the homeopaths!

GC: Do you have a favorite non-homeopathic book?

Dr. Luc: I can’t remember when I read my last novel; that must be ages ago.

I truly love biographies, true adventures, battles of WWII, the battle between the Boers and the English and books about true suffering in this world. And all the books of Carl Jung! They brought me immense joy and education in introspection of the human shadow side, as well as my own.

Suffering is an everyday fact of life for 90% of the people. Reading about it moves me and directs my life aspirations to bring the little I can do to relieve the suffering of people.

GC: What changes have you seen in the homeopathic community since you first began practicing, and how do you feel about the way it is going? Has anything happened in the homeopathic community that has upset you?

Dr. Luc: The "changes" I have seen in homeopathy are in fact nothing new.

The great masters I mentioned before had to struggle with the same issues as we do today: the bastardizing of true homeopathy, the infecting of pure homeopathy with speculations and nonsense. The main reason for that is that most practitioners look for easy ways to practice homeopathy, based on the allopathic model with its "protocols," which requires little thinking.

Let’s face it: There is nothing easy about homeopathy! It requires dedication, hard work, little financial rewards but enormous personal ones!

Of all the modalities I studied, internal medicine, neurology, and acupuncture, homeopathy is by far the most challenging! What makes me upset? Those new aged self appointed gurus who call Hahnemann an old senile and the Organon, "an old dusty bible." Those homeopaths who try to convince us that they found a new improved method, experimenting on patients, but only show their lack of profound study of the Organon and Chronic Diseases as Hahnemann already did what they exclaim to be "new." Worse, it was rejected by Hahnemann, but nevertheless, these modern gurus will say, "But Hahnemann did it too!" And those homeopaths that teach "protocols" in cancer cases to an audience that is not familiar with the true laws of homeopathy and is therefore seduced to apply these dangerous techniques on unsuspected patients. I do not expect that anything will change in the near future. Human nature is lazy by nature, and using those brain cells to its maximum capacity is given to few. In spite of all this, true homeopathy will always survive while the speculative methods will only be a foot note in the history of homeopathy, if that at all!

While practitioners have their own responsibilities, the pharmaceutical industry will do anything to suppress homeopathy. In my opinion, homeopathy truly has a chance only in countries where pharmaceutical industries have no interest because there is no money at all. This is fortunately or unfortunately still the case for millions of people.

GC: Do you have a favorite homeopathic pharmacy, or, what do you see as the relative merits of the different ones?

Dr. Luc: I am only familiar with pharmacies I worked with and apologize in advance for leaving others out. I like the Natural Health Supply in Santa Fe, NM, and Hahnemann Laboratories in California. They produce excellent often hand succussed remedies for the profession.

GC: Some health care providers see homeopathy as 'soft' medicine - something that might have benefit for minor ailments and animals - but when it comes to serious illnesses like cancer, the big guns of conventional medicine are needed. Even among alternative practitioners, only a small proportion count homeopathy as their first line of treatment. A patient will likely receive a different prescription (diet, vitamins, enzymes, herbs, exercise, nutraceuticals etc) depending on which natural health care provider he visits.

We have experienced that even those who use homeopathy for years are not immune to serious health problems. On page 246 of Achieving and Maintaining the Simillimum by Dr. Luc De Schepper, you suggest that, when people develop life-threatening diseases while under homeopathic care, it is either the fault of the patient or the doctor, and that homeopathy would prevent these diseases, if it were done properly.

In general terms, what can you say to help a person facing serious disease, so that he can prioritize the vast array of treatment options that he has, and choose the path which will give him the best shot at life, with the confidence that he has made the best possible choice?

Dr. Luc: The issue of treating serious diseases should not be an issue, especially when we can promise a true cure. But most practitioners and alternative doctors will turn to vitamins, injections, etc. I know all about this as earlier in my career I practiced this and studied it. However it is done for the reasons I have discussed before: it is much easier to apply (protocols!) and there is a lot of money to be earned in it (none of these two interested me so I abandoned it). And the layperson and patient thinks that homeopathy is only good for everyday occurrences, like a fall, a bruise, an insect bite, etc. Nothing is further from the truth. We have a 200 year history to prove it. Homeopathy truly can cure asthma, eczema, shingles, heart disease, strokes, etc., all conditions that allopathy "controls," not cures. And a true cure is only achieved when that condition does not recur after treatment. I only have to point to the 25 million prescriptions a year of antibiotics for ear infections in children. Ask those same physicians if they can give something so these ear infections won’t come back? They can’t! Homeopathy can. While allopathy still has to cure the first patient with genetic therapy (a billion dollar research), homeopathy has already achieved it since 1828 when Hahnemann introduced his miasmatic theory. Many diseases these days are the results of a jungle of factors: iatrogenic or doctor’s induced diseases (more people die from allopathic drugs every year than from car accidents); life style andhygiene: this should put a stop to the introduction of vaccinations to Third World countries while spending the same money to improve hygiene and hunger, the first cause of epidemics; and then there are the true chronic diseases, which we need to address according to their causality, genetic factors and symptoms. While I admire anyone studying homeopathy, too few have the time, ambition and perseverance to make it their sole goal. Yet it is necessary, like in any profession, to just do that to become a master in homeopathy. "A patient destined to die will die," so says a Chinese proverb. Even here, homeopathy is the king among the healing modalities to alleviate the suffering of the dying patient! One word of caution: curing a chronic disease takes time! That’s what the nature of "chronic" is. Turn away from homeopaths who promise you a fast cure and turn away those patients "who give you one month to cure their 25 year illness!" Do you think they ask the same from their allopathic physician?

To finish these questions with a thought. There are many masters we can learn from. One of the people I most admire is Carl Jung, the famous psychiatrist. He practiced as an unconscious homeopath, applying the same principles and guidelines! I wished he had our tools, the homeopathic remedies. But I am grateful to him for his dedication and great insight in the human psyche. For me, he is another true genius like Hahnemann!

GC: Within the last few years, you and a handful of serious homeopathic teachers have rekindled interest in the prescribing techniques of von Boenninghausen. With several more modern repertories available, which have thousands of additional remedies and rubrics, why is it that you choose the Boger-von Boenninghausen Repertory for so many of your students? What is the essence and uniqueness of Boenninghausen's teaching?

Dr. Luc: Very often, I hear in seminars that we can't possibly find the simillimum for our patient "because we have not proved that specific remedy yet." It always reminds me of Hahnemann and then von Boenninghausen how they had so much success with 100 to 125 remedies at their disposition. Von Boenninghausen has never disappointed me whenever I applied his method.

Drawing on his vast experience, von Boenninghausen concluded that "the conditions of aggravation and amelioration are not confined to this or that particular symptom but they apply to ALL of the symptoms of the case." So the conditions of aggravations and ameliorations have a far more significant relation to the totality of the symptoms and become the most important factor to determine the simillimum. The NWS or etiology is the number one modality (if known), then come all the other modalities; the concomitant symptoms (called "unreasonable attendants") are second most important. Then sensation, location, pathology and last only, mental/emotional changes are taken into account for the patient's case. Why is this so effective? It follows A95 of the Organon, which explains that patients become accustomed to their prolonged suffering and don't really know anymore what real health is. But concomitant symptoms and modalities have often remained unchanged during this time and are easier to determine than the evaluation of the psyche of the patient, which can be subjected to different interpretations. But on the question, "Is your shoulder pain worse or better by lying on it," most patients can give you a clear answer.

I like the method for acute as well as chronic cases, as it shows often the layer remedy, the true constitution of the patient and the acute remedy all at the same time. It is also by far the easiest method to teach and understand, and can be taught in one weekend! And yet it is so little known worldwide!

GC: I understand that Scholten successfully uses the location of each chemical element in the periodic table to predict medicinal uses for the homeopathic form of that element. You have written an entire book on Homeopathy and the Periodic Table in which you say "I am afraid that Scholten's work, as it stands, will never be integrated into the definitive homeopathic materia medica." Can you give us an idea about the similarities and differences between your use of the periodic table and Scholten's ?

Dr. Luc: I was initially fascinated with the analysis of the Periodic Table and homeopathy. First of all, many homeopaths (H. Roberts and Farrington to name a few) had already discussed possible family relationships in these elements. Obviously Scholten took it a step further by now filling in the blanks and making new combinations of remedies, derived solely from their neighborhood to known elements. However I did not like this vast speculation, only supported by few clinical cases (and what about all those cases with the same remedy that did not give a result?). In his introduction in Analytical Repertory of the Symptoms of the Mind, C. Hering states, "There are two different kinds of symptoms, those produced and those cured, and they are essentially different … The marking of such different origin should always be done with the utmost care in the monograph of the Materia Medica; it should then be a matter of the highest importance never to mix indiscriminately, symptoms reported as cured (not having been observed on the healthy), with the symptoms produced by the drug (Provings). Hahnemann was right, when he advised us not to be ruled by former cures, but always by the symptoms produced."

Hahnemann warns us not to "infect" our Materia Medica with proven cases, but the only parameter is the proving of the substance. Therefore I investigated by only using the elements of the Periodic Table that were proven, if I could not only expand my knowledge of well known polychrests, but at the same time use this method to facilitate the finding of the simillimum. It turned out to be the case so I am grateful to Scholten for at least bringing new interest to the Period Table and Homeopathy. However, I proved that we do not have to "speculate" about unknown elements and experiment with these "new" unproven remedies on our patients. If we want to do experimentation, let' s follow Hahnemann's lead: let's conduct provings on ourselves and family members!

GC: Some homeopaths are concerned about the difference between the way Kent practiced homeopathy, that is, using single doses of high potencies, and the way Hahnemann describes the fifty millesimal potency method in the 6th edition of the Organon. On your website it says you treat people exclusively with LM potencies. I have heard it said that Hahnemann may have had a touch of senility when he wrote the sixth edition. From your experience and study, how do you compare the value of Kent's method vs the LM method?

Dr. Luc: It is not correct that I treated patients exclusively with LM potencies but I certainly was one of the first in this country to treat patients with LM potencies in the correct way. However the discovery of the 5th edition split method, to which I came later, was a huge improvement in treating patients. LMs are very penetrating and fast working and patients with their allopathic mindset often abused it in a mechanical way (even homeopaths do it). This always leads to unnecessary similar aggravations (removed from the 6th edition as not being necessary!) and the formation of more complex diseases. Now I would treat at least 70% of the chronic patient cases with the 5th edition split method and 100% of the acutes with this split method. Results are astonishing and if applied worldwide, would change the face of practice of homeopathy. My only hope is that the 90% of the homeopaths stuck in the 4th edition, will take advantage of these advanced methods of Hahnemann and see the remarkable, speedy and gentle cures as promised in A2 of the Organon. It is Kent who steered all the next generations of homeopaths on the wrong path, as he never bothered to use the 5th edition split method (which he could have-1833!) and with his belief that the "dose (or amount of pellets) was of no importance". This goes into the face of everything Hahnemann said and what every observing practitioner has seen. Although in his Lesser Writings , Kent stated that "no similar aggravation" is what we need to strive for, he was known to have caused countless severe aggravations. Unfortunately, even well known homeopaths today, think that they need to cause a "similar aggravation" in order to know they applied the simillimum, something Hahnemann had removed from his teachings in the 6th edition of the Organon (A161). Kent and therefore most homeopaths under his influence, never even applied watery doses and never dared to repeat a dose "while the patient was improving, A246." Regarding the "myth" that Hahnemann was suffering from senility in his later years, it is a cheap excuse for those who claim so to abandon Hahnemann's teachings and apply their own frivolities. One only has to study the microfiches of his Paris years and read statements from those that were present in those years (Dr Croserio, read Lesser Writings of von Boenninghausen) to observe that until the last days of his life he remained a staunch intellectual, industrious 'till the end to provide us with his last legacy, the LM potency. For more about this split method and Hahnemann’s later years, I refer the reader to my book, Achieving and Maintaining the Simillimum.

GC: We have listed several of your books - could you give a one-line explanation of each, to indicate how/when it might best be used:

GC: Is there a particular attitude or feeling that you like to encourage among the students at RI?

Dr. Luc: There is only one attitude I like to encourage: be faithful first to Hahnemann’s teachings and always build on his principles. Second: in order to become a good practitioner (which you OWE to the patient), you will have to study countless hours of homeopathy. If you want to become a master in anything, studiousness, perseverance, honesty and love for that profession are indispensable!

GC: What might students find at the RI that they wouldn't find at other homeopathic schools?

Dr. Luc: I have been in schools worldwide and was present on many seminars.

I was always astonished to see first that hardly a method was taught to find the simillimum, and second, worst of all, hardly any management was ever instructed, depriving the student of the most important aspect of the methodology. How often have I heard, "I gave the patient this remedy and five months later he was all better." Is this what we see in the practice?

Of course not! You are lucky if the patient does not phone you the next day with questions and reactions. My books are all based on my teachings and I teach five different methods to find the simillimum in my schools.

GC: When and what was your initial vision of the Renaissance Institute, and how has it grown and changed until today? With regards to the course content, in what ways do you feel it is still evolving, and in what ways has it reached a steady state?

Dr. Luc: I was disappointed initially with what I could receive in other schools. This encouraged me to follow my own path and study the old masters (in Ann Harbor, MI), reviewing thousands of pages of the old journals. This was my real education. In 1993 I founded my own school, RICH. Regarding homeopathic education in the US, homeopathy has to struggle against much misconception and the usual allopathic suppression. As long as homeopathy is not a "recognized profession," homeopathy is obstructed in its progress.

Homeopathy must follow the lead of the acupuncture schools, but even they had to fight for a long time and are not considered a threat to the pharmaceutical companies as homeopathy is. I am afraid that the struggle will remain and that the idea of creating a 4 year homeopathic school in this country that is part of the Medical Board of Assurance will remain a pipe dream. It has been tried many times before, but for many different reasons always remained unsuccessful. Such schools can only be created in poor countries like India and South Africa, or in future countries where there is a large segment of dirt poor people.

GC: How do the Renaissance Institute students learn conventional medical sciences - anatomy, physiology, biochemistry?

Dr. Luc: Most of my students are licensed in their own profession and have been exposed more or less to the conventional medical sciences. I always have encouraged the lay people in my school, to enroll in community colleges to follow these courses, even more, I encouraged them to become a nurse, acupuncturist, psychotherapist, etc and many have followed my advice. Again, only when we are able to create a school like the acupuncture schools, can this become part of our homeopathic school program.

GC: At what stage does RI encourage the use of homeopathic software for research, repertorization and case analysis: beginner, intermediate or advanced?

Dr. Luc: I strongly object to the use of software in the first year of education. Too many times have I seen on seminars that students were expecting all the answers of the computer, simply because they were never taught to determine the value of symptoms (A153). Doing the hard work first in books will facilitate the use of these software programs. If I would encourage buying one program, it would be Boger's Von Boenninghausen (BG2) program, as long as you have been taught how to use it as this information sadly does not come with the computer program.

GC: Do you encourage students to get involved in cases with serious pathology ? Have you or your school ever documented significant improvement in such cases?

Dr. Luc: A well-trained homeopath is inevitably drawn in his practice to serious pathology. I have experienced this myself in my whole career. Is it not so that the homeopath is often the last to be consulted by desperate patients, once they have been given up by allopathy and other modalities?

While we would prefer differently, we still can do much good. And for us, there are only patients with a disease, not diseases. The knowledge of the miasmatic theory is certainly a must in treating and understanding severe pathological cases. Regarding documentation: I had nothing but the opportunity to do so during my practice and several of my excellent students are able to do this now too. Of course, because it is not in a double blind study, these wonderful, successful cases will be called "anecdotal." I am pleased to have had so many anecdotal cures in my career and time permitting, I will involve myself more in serious studies with homeopathic treatment regarding specific diseases, which would be more acceptable to the allopathic world.

GC: What would your say to prospective students who are considering trying to learn homeopathy by reading books , rather than taking a course of study?

Dr. Luc: First of all, I wished that my own books that I wrote were available when I started as a homeopathic student. It would have saved me much trouble and failure; I had to do it the hard way, not the high way! As mentioned before, I have much to thank from sticking my nose in all those old homeopathic journals. Taking a course of study versus a school program?

I wrote a nine page article (will appear in AJHM this winter) about how to motivate the student to commitment of homeopathic studies through "innovative" methods. Like any stool to sit on, we need at least three legs: first a capable teacher, second a dedicated smart student and third a method to be taught. Anything less will not do. But what is the point if the school offers clinical supervision and the supervisor is inadequate in management? Is this a case of the blind leading the blind? Homeopathy's greatest threat, like before, is inadequate teaching and indoctrination in theories that are deviating from our basic laws. And not many find the time, perseverance and opportunity to study on their own for years at the time, 8 hours a day, seven days a week. Personally I like the camaraderie and new friendships created in our classes and the support each student provides the other.

GC: What is the educational background of most of the people who attend RI?

Is there a common attitude found among most students of RI, which may not be so common in other schools? What homeopathic certification exam does graduation from RI prepare one for? Is more study necessary for the certification exam? Are there any state licensing exams that can be written after graduation? What clinical experience does the RI provide?

Dr. Luc: Most people attending my schools are professionals in some health branch and as I mentioned before, those that are not, I encourage strongly becoming a health practitioner. Not only because some allopathic knowledge will make it easier to practice, but also because the homeopath will have more influence in his community. I used to do school tests on regular basis but have found it to be counterproductive. Some students are intimidated by written exams; above all, it took too much time away from my teachings. And the best always survive. I do every weekend live, clinical cases and these cases are followed up for their management each subsequent month, year after year if possible. The students (in small groups) work on the live case first before I provide my assessment. It gives me the opportunity to go around and see who and where he student is struggling. That is more productive than what I did in the past. As I said before, the motivation of the student, if he wants just to dabble a little in homeopathy or become a good practitioner, is not determined with some exams. He needs to examine his own character daily and put his best foot forward. There are no state licensing examinations in this country no matter what they want you to believe. The CHC exam is an attempt to test people but coming from all kinds of different programs, and put together by practitioners themselves who are stuck in the 4th edition, I put little importance on it as it does not allow you to be "licensed" in homeopathy and in my opinion does not reflect if you are a good practitioner.

GC: What is the most important thing for a student to be aware of, in order to establish a successful practice of homeopathy?

Dr. Luc: I was never in any phone book during my years of practice and my biggest problem was to handle the mass of patients. Good work does its public relations by itself. I never hesitated to be a mouth piece for homeopathy through speeches, lectures, work shops and of course writing.

Anyone of us can do this (there is always Arg-n for those who tremble at the thought) and it is more productive than paying much money for advertising. Treat what you think you can, and above all treat yourself first by looking at what Jung called, your "shadow side." You would be surprised that you can find your simillimum there! !

GC: Can you name some graduates who have gone on to establish successful, full time practices? Who have written books, or contributed at seminars or with provings?

Dr. Luc: There are several students of mine that have a successful practice. None of them have written books but they are often locally involved in spreading the word of homeopathy through lecturing. I guess they leave the writing of books to me.

GC: Where do you hold classes, and how do people get more information?