Medicine and philosophy - Classical Homeopathy Online

116 Hippocratic Corpus and Diocles of CarystusOn Internal Affections 10 shows, in order to bring about the best conditionor ‘mode of living’ () of a patient who is almost certainly goingto die:When the case is such, the patient wastes away sorrily for a year, and dies; you musttreat him very actively and strengthen him . . . If treated in such a way, the patientwill fare best in the disease; the disease is usually mortal, and few escape it. 56Furthermore, in a passage from On Diseases 3.15 the doctor is even advisedto tell the patient about the hopelessness of his case before engaging intreatment:If the sputum is not being cleaned out effectively, if respiration is rapid, and ifexpectoration is failing, announce that there is no hope of survival; unless thepatient can help with the cleaning. But still treat as is appropriate for pneumonia,if the lower cavity cooperates with you. 57In these writings, then, treatment is recommended in virtually all caseswhatever the outcome. The outcome is sometimes said to be that the patientwill become healthy again; 58 but there are also several cases in which theresult is left vague. 59A second, striking, fact is that it is often left at the doctor’s discretionwhether to follow a particular course of treatment, or even whether toengage in treatment at all. The tentative, by no means rigid character ofHippocratic treatment is indicated by expressions such as ‘if you wish’, ‘ifyou think it is right’, ‘if you treat him’, ‘if you wish to treat him’, 60 ‘if you donot want to give him the drug’. 61 This is not to say that, for the Hippocraticdoctors, treatment does not aim at restoring health; indeed, apart from themany cases where treatment is said to result in a recovery of health, thereare several occasions where treatment is advocated not because lack oftreatment would result in the patient’s death but because it would causethe disease to become chronic and ‘to age with’ (), 62 or56 Int. Aff. 10 (7.190 L.): (tr. Potter (1998) vol. vi, 105). See also Int.27 (7.238 L.): , and von Staden (1990) 108 (about On Diseases 1.6): ‘easing thepatient’s condition or prolonging his or her life’; also Int. Aff. 12 (7.196 L.): (although this case is not hopeless).57 7.140 L. (tr. Potter (1988) vol. vi, 37). On verbal intervention see von Staden (1990) 109–11.58 E.g. Int. Aff. 9 (7.188 L.); 12 (7.198 L.); 21 (7. 220 L.).59 E.g. On Diseases 2.15 (7.28 L.); 2.29 (7.46 L.).60 On Diseases 3.3 (7.122 L.); 3.7 (7.126 L.); 3.13 (7.134 L.); 3.17 (7.156 L.).61 Int. Aff. 10 (7.192 L.): .62 E.g. On Diseases 2.73 (7.112 L.).