It’s Tuesday and I’m getting ready for another day in the clinic in Kasoa. Clinic has been a bit ‘quiet’ of late, but today feels exceptional as am expecting ‘grandma’. Not had a review with grandma for about 6 weeks. Although my student has been reviewing regularly and reporting back to me, it is his case after all! Looking forward to seeing grandma. Really looking forward to seeing her

We (student and I) have been treating grandma for a foot ulcer that had deteriorated to the point where a hospital recommended amputation of her foot. Deep fissures, necrotic tissue and an exposed tendon as a result of the deterioration whilst in hospital. Student referred grandma to me when grandma had refused amputation and was being discharged from hospital. So it is the student’s case really!

I’d attended three consultations. By the third, there was the start of granulation, a good blood supply and physical sensations returning to grandma’s foot. Great!! So looking forward to seeing how we are progressing.

So off I set, its just started to rain a little, but its only a bit of rain and only the weather! Sun has been very hot here recently, so a little cooling rain is very welcome. Sure it will stop soon. So onwards down the road I go, rain not easing up but manageable. Rain quickly moves from manageable to a torrential downpour half way into my journey. Soaked from head to toe! Do I return home to get dry and wait ‘til rain stops? No, onwards I go, no turning back now! ‘No turning back’ a bit of a metaphor for my approach to life, since arriving in Ghana 5 years ago. In spite of challenges, uncertainty and more than fleeting glances into the past, not knowing what will come next, onwards I’ve gone and mostly been happily surprised by the next event!

So a fearless dash through the rain to the clinic, I arrive in the clinic drenched through and through.

A kind offer of a towel and a tablecloth, remedies my situation as I strip off, wring out clothing, and drape them over a screen in the consultation room. Fortunately its ‘light on’ so hopefully under the ceiling fan, clothes will dry soon. Don’t know what grandma would think, seeing ‘doctor’ clothed in a tablecloth!

Thank you God! Enough clothing dried a couple of hours later, to make me look respectable, and grandma arrives.
Grandma looks great and strong, and in very good humour, as she mocks us all and giggles along with us. Lots of raucous laughter in the consultation room!

Dressings removed to reveal more areas of healthy tissue and skin, Wonderful signs of a continuing healing process , mind , body and spirit, as grandma now able to share personal history, grief, losses, events. What kinds of things worry you grandma? we ask.
‘Whether my maize and cassava is ok on my farm.’ She replies. Aaahh!

The remedies have worked wonders.

Lovely Lin emailed me recently saying it’s a wonderful thing to do for someone.

Never looked at it that way, as I just ‘do’ homeopathy. But yes you’re right Lin, it is! Thanks for the re-assuring pat on the back. A bigger one from me to my student. It’s his case after all…. and grandma’s doing beautifully!!

Her homeopathic and healing practice is complemented by facilitating  healing and meditation workshops.  Details of how she works can be found on her website www.backtothesource.co.uk.  Before becoming involved with healing, her career evolved from secretarial support to event management and fund raising, and then on to research and writing.  Over the years she has been involved with various committees on a voluntary basis.  All of this experience contributes enormously to her homeopathic practice as do her other interests which include meditation, travel, writing, hiking, and gardening.

“For me homeopathy is more than a gentle system of healing; it is also empowering, sustainable, and transformative. I am delighted to be part of  Homeopathy in Ghana, and intend to contribute all I can to its continued success and development.  I hope too that the project model is looked at favourably and even adopted by other African countries”

A unique opportunity has arisen for delegates from the Ghana Homeopathy Project to attend the Pan-African homeopathy conference in Kwale, Kenya in May 2012. This is a great opportunity to share experiences and contribute views regarding the value of homeopathy across the African continent.

An Ideal Representative

Julius Berdie

We would very much like to send Ghanaian homeopath Julius Berdie who is Principal of the newly established Homeopathic College in Accra.  Julius has been practicing with the project for the past 10 years and is therefore an excellent representative to speak about his experiences in education, and the clinical application of homeopathy in Ghana.

Your help can make it a success

We appeal to your generosity to help us make this trip possible, by raising funds to cover the airfare from Accra to Kenya and conference costs, for Julius Berdie to represent the Ghana Homeopathy Project at the Pan-African Congress, as our contribution is valuable to the development of homeopathy in Africa.

We would also like to thank Julius for his hard and continuous work in establishing homeopathy in Ghana.

So please dig deep and donate now.

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The course was very hands on. In one village we saw up to 250 patients. It called for very quick and decisive prescribing by our teachers. Luckily we got opportunities later in the course to learn by discussing the specifics of many cases.

Download Angie’s report from the Ghana study trip in October 2011. (PDF)

I had never been to Africa before, and had never worked for a homeopathic charity before either. So it was a big experience, the effects of which will last until I am able to go again!
The course itself was beneficial. I enjoyed studying with the Doctors Battacharyea, and found their complementary way of teaching differential diagnosis and materia medica very appealing. For me there was just the right amount of clinical experience and lecture time. I especially benefited from the clinical setting. Although treatment decisions were made quickly, there was often time to discuss a case later in the day, and also to talk about related disease processes and materia medica. It was amazing how both doctors could lecture on the spot in such depth, without any preparation time. I also enjoyed taking cases myself, and having some supervision from the doctors if I felt I needed it.

The clinical experience was excellent, with a wide range of pathology seen and a good number of patients. It would have been nice to see more follow-ups, and I would really like to hear from Emperor how our patients are doing over the next 6 months. The trips to outreach clinics were a valuable experience as well, especially in Mepe, where we saw so many amazing cases of pathology and where the numbers posed such a challenge. I actually enjoyed the pressure and the buzz of those two days. I wish I could pop back to take the follow-ups! I enjoyed the challenge of using an interpreter, and of having to adapt to such a different client base from what I see at home. The trips to Vane and Ehe were also challenging and adventuresome, and helped to open our eyes to the task of developing homeopathy in Ghana.

The accommodation for the course was good, our room and beds were very comfortable, and I loved the outdoor showers. The food was good and I found our meals together to be a very pleasant time of camaraderie and mutual support. The information given to us before leaving the UK was adequate and we were fairly well prepared for what was to come. It was unfortunate that Angie’s Ghana phone had no signal at Mafi Seva. I would get my own sim card next time, I think, as I ran up quite a bill on my UK phone.

The morning excursion to the market was really fun and I wouldn’t have wanted to miss it. It was good to experience some of African culture. The trip to Keta was disappointing, as the beach was beautiful and we got so little time there. I would recommend that future study trips have one day off in the intense two week period so that participants can enjoy the beach for a day. The last day spent in Accra was also good, and I would feel comfortable enough to go there on my own next time if I were travelling to the college or to Dr. Julius’s clinic.

To conclude, the study trip to Ghana was a life-changing experience and well worth doing. I have made a list of changes I want to make in my homeopathic practice, and I intend to further my study of the Organon, Allen’s Key Notes, and Dilip Battacharyea’s book on Psychiatry now that I am home. I hope to volunteer at Mafi Seva Clinic again in the future and will continue to support the clinic staff in any way I can from England.

The project has evolved in the intervening years in some very positive directions. My trip this time was divided into two distinct parts. The first week I spent in the peace and calm of Mafi Seva ( now on mains electricity) watching the daily routine going on around me, photographing the chickens, lizard,s goats and the children with huge bundles of sticks on their heads who mysteriously traverse the compound from time to time and ,of course, seeing patients.

People arrived, sometimes from a considerable distance away, and were welcomed to our table in the shade where they told us about their aches and pains and also about their stories. Even in the calmest of rural existences there can be tragedy and hardship. From the woman whose son had been imprisoned following an accidental but fatal shooting and who had had to pay a fortune to get him out of prison at the end of a four- year term to the young man who had himself been shot whilst gold-mining and whose friend had not been seen since; from people who had been cheated out of all their money to men struggling to support far too many wives and children; from violent itchy skin eruptions to IBS and the ever present arthritis, consequence of long years spent labouring in the fields. The rhythm of life is calm and steady, however, and the cares and worries of urban life in the UK just slip away. I walked around the fields of peppers and cassava and watched the women in the neighbouring village grind and roast the latter to make gari. This versatile tuber is also the basis of Ghanaian staples, fufu and banku, and of tapioca. Our clinic in that village had to be cut short, sadly, as the rain came and threatened to wash the road away leaving us there for longer than intended.

Emperor was my translator and co-prescriber in Mafi Seva, and Pastor John joined us for some of the time. It was good to see old friends again and to sit discussing homeopathy with two such accomplished practitioners and to see their continued enthusiasm for learning.

When the time came to leave we got a trotro from the village to Adidome, the district capital where Emperor and I had been invited to meet the Mayor and the head of the local administration, both of whom were delighted to learn of the homeopathic work going on at Mafi Seva and were very interested in the impending arrival of the Doctors Bhattacharyea. The contrast with the entrenched attitudes and prejudices of bureaucrats in the UK was stark.

On our return to Accra the change of pace hit me. The crowds, the traffic, the street traders and the roadside stalls are almost overwhelming in their profusion; it is an exciting place. It is also hot and a challenge to negotiate – especially when one is trying to follow one’s red suitcase as it disappears into the distance on the head of a young girl who is, in turn, trying to keep up with Emperor!

On my previous visit, when I was staying and working with long-term volunteer Mel Duprès, we had been based at Banana Inn, an urban suburb in the vast sprawl of Accra, but the second week of my trip this time was to be at the School in Kasoa.

Teaching at PISHAM

The Premier Institute of Homeopathy and …… is located in this market town on the edge of Accra on the way to Cape Coast. The building comprises a classroom and clinic rooms where the students can observe and participate in case-taking with Julius Berdie, the Director, or Grace Rhoomes, a UK trained homeopath who has come to live in a coastal village nearby; I was lucky enough to be staying with Grace and Openi in their house by the beach.

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There are two intakes of students in training at the School; I started with a four-day stint with the 2nd years and then had three days teaching the first years. Students come from a variety of work backgrounds. Many are employed in complementary health clinics already and will therefore have a head-start as they move into practice. Here they are not only having to learn the complexities of classical homeopathy and repertorisation but they are having to learn it all in a second language.
Their achievement is nonetheless impressive. We worked with role-play and the students’ own presentations of materia medica on the principle that effective learning is an active process rather than a passive one but the classroom is also equipped with projector and whiteboard to facilitate the more formal side of things. Seven days teaching is hard work, of course but, as anyone with experience of teaching knows, it can also be energising and very fulfilling. It feels worthwhile and constructive to be involved in training new generations of homeopaths who will in turn be taking homeopathy forward for years to come.

Having discovered on my previous trip how friendly and helpful Ghanaians are and how easy it is to get around I followed my time with the Ghana Project with a short trip of my own up to Cape Coast and Elmina to learn a bit more about the history of Ghana and to visit some conservation enterprises around the National Park. It was a fascinating, albeit thought provoking and at times disturbing experience. I would thoroughly recommend that volunteers consider taking a bit of extra time if they possibly can to do something similar.

This fund raising archived below resulted in more than £700 collected and enabled Emperor to attend training in India in Jan/Feb this year.

A great big thank you to all who contributed – We couldn’t do it without you!

— archived message —

I recently returned from Ghana.

Emperor - For further homeopathic studies

I was much inspired by our trainee homeopath and clinical director of the Mafi-Seva Community Health Centre, Emperor. A small team of homeopaths and 15 of our Ghanaian students joined to offer homeopathic treatment to the rural communities of the lower Volta region. We saw over 400 patients, some with acute presentations and many suffering from chronic complaints. Many good results have been reported and new patients are arriving daily at the Mafi-Seva Community Health Centre.

The Ghana Homeopathy Project would like to support Emperor in his development as a homeopath and we are fundraising for the travel costs to take Emperor to train with some wonderful Indian homeopaths in Kolkata, who have 30 years experience treating patients and conditions similar to those found in Ghana. Emperor is now becoming well known in the area where local people sometimes travel for hours to see him.

We would like to help him gain more experience with long term chronic case management, much needed now. He shares what he has learnt with his 2 trainees and the students at the new school and this way we can spread training and skills in homeopathy in Ghana, sharing our love for homeopathy across continents.

We appreciate your continuing support of our work to educate local people and promote homeopathy in Ghana for the benefit of the local communities.
Many thanks
Kind regards
Angie Metzger
Ghana Homeopathy Project – Co-ordinator

Born in 1949 in Iran, Soroush showed an early interest in biology and zoology and things medical.  However, when he arrived in UK aged 16 he faced major language difficulties and after a year had to drop biology so that he could concentrate on physics, chemistry and mathematics.  This meant that he could not study medicine at university.

Soroush studied Paper Science at University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST).  He then followed this with a post graduate diploma in Production Management and worked in the paper industry until 1982.  He then formed his own exporting company and concentrated on that.

In 1991, purely by chance he saw BBC2′s QED programme which showed how effective homeopathy was and that its action was real and not due to the placebo effect.  He then attended two evening class courses and was then guided by his tutor to attend the London School of Classical Homeopathy, where he was impressed by the teachings of Sheilagh Creasy.   Having finished his second year, the turn of events forced him to be in Iran for two years.  Whilst in Iran he managed to attend courses there and to keep up with his studies. Once back in UK, he switched to the London College of Classical Homeopathy and in his final year was supervised by Sheilagh Creasy for a number of his college cases.

After graduation in 1999 he has spent much time promoting homeopathy both by delivering lectures or writing articles for the press.  He continues his study of homeopathy by attending lectures whenever possible and especially Sheilagh Creasy’s Master Classes.

He says he will do anything to promote homeopathy!  So when the opportunity arose to assist with the Ghana Project to enable Homeopathy to be taught and practised in Ghana, he pledged his full support because it is an opportunity to make a vast difference to the general health of a population by offering effective and importantly cheap medicine.

Angie and Bonsu prepare a big shipment of books to Ghana

This summer (2010) we were able to send over 1,000 homeopathic books to Ghana. Some of these will form the first homeopathic libraries in Ghana The others, especially Repertories and Materia Medicas have been distributed to our Ghanaian students. These books are not available to buy in Ghana so the students are delighted to receive them. Thank you to all in the homeopathic community who have generously donated books and educational materials.