Disorders of concentration and homoeopathic management

Shamitha M J

Concentration has been defined as “the ability to direct one’s thinking in whatever direction one would intend”. Concentration is very important in accomplishing any work. It is usual for a normal person to get distracted sometimes but if it happens for prolonged period, it may indicating some disease condition. It can affect individual’s personal growth, relationships and employment adversely.

CAUSES

The following  are the factors which affects the concentration :

1. Medical causes:

Traumatic brain injury, stroke, sleep apnoea, visual disorders, dementia, hypothyroidism, cushing syndrome, chronic fatigue syndrome, epilepsy, toxicity from heavy metals can cause difficulty in concentration.

2. Emotional and psychological causes:

Stress, generalized anxiety disorder, depression, emotional trauma, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia  affects the  ability to concentrate in adverse way.

3. Cognition derangement:

Defect at the cognition level can cause poor concentration, the diseases which affects cognition are Attention disorder: Attention deficit hyperactive disorder, learning disabilities like dyslexia.

4. Hormonal changes:

Abnormal level of hormones such as estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, and thyroid hormone can cause problem with cognition, memory and concentration. During menopause and pregnancy there could be difficulty in concentration due to hormonal fluctuation.

5. Nutritional deficiency:

Concentration is severely impaired by weight loss diet because brain requires essential fatty acids. Diet which is poor in protein content may ruin concentration capacity because amino acids in the proteins are very important for producing certain brain chemicals which are necessary for maintaining concentration. Processed also food affects concentration adversely.

6. Lack of sleep:

It affects your capacity to concentrate and your mental process can slow down if you don’t get enough sleep.

7. Side effects certain medications can affect concentration badly, those are:

Benzodiazepines, opioids, antidepressants, anticonvulsant, corticosteroids, NSAIDs, some chemotherapy drugs , some cardiac drugs , etc.

8. other causes :

Drug abuse, alcoholism, etc may reduce the ability to concentrate.

CLINICAL FEATURES:

• Unable to carry out everyday activities as usual
• Restlessness
• Mental cloudiness
• Cannot think clearly
• Failure to complete tasks within allotted time
• Having trouble recalling recent events
• Frequently losing things and having trouble remembering where they are
• Difficulty in making decisions.

HOMOEOPATHIC MANAGEMENT:
Homoeopathy can help in the improvement of concentration. Homoeopathy medicine can be used safely without side effects with the advice of homeopathic physician

Dr Hahneman in the aphorism 5 of Organon of medicine, advised physician, to cure the disease should investigate exciting cause in the acute disease and fundamental cause especially in chronic disease, the ascertainable physical constitution of the patient, moral and intellectual characters, his occupation, mode of living and habits, his social and domestic relationships, his age, sexual functions etc are to be taken into considerations.

In aphorism 212, Dr Hahnemann stated a chief ingredient of all diseases are changes in the mental and emotional state of the patient and at the same time, every medicine alters the mental and emotional state of the prover in a characteristic way. For this reason he said in aphorism 213 “one will never cure in accordance with nature unless one attends to the symptoms of the mental and emotional state together with the other symptoms in every case of disease.”

Dr.Kent laid greatest importance to the will, understanding and memory of the patient. They form the innermost of the man, and are extended outward through the general physical organism. Cure takes place from centre to periphery, but if the symptoms retreat from periphery to centre the prescription is wrong and must be antidoted. Hence in order to treat successfully, the homoeopath should know the correspondence of organs and direction of cure.

THERAPEUTICS:

Anacardium- Absent mindedness, brain fag, impaired memory, thinks he is possessed of two wills, anxiety when walking as if pursued, profound melancholy with tendency to use violent language.

Baryta carb- Slowness in the development of the brain, so that they are late learning to do things like late leaning to talk, late learning to read, delay in perception. Cannot teach the child anything because they either cannot comprehend or they cannot memorize or they cannot maintain a thought. Child doesn’t want pay attention to anything, want to sit in the corner with aversion to company. Senile dementia.

Calc carb- Child is fat and flabby with excessive sour perspiration mostly on the upper part the body, takes cold easily, suffers from forgetfulness. Confused mind. Slight mental efforts produces hot head. Aversion to work or exertion.

Cannabis indica – Very forgetful, forgets last word and ideas, begins a sentence forgets what he intends to speak. Inability to recall any thought or event on account of other thought  other thoughts crowding his brain.

Conium- Unable to sustain any mental efforts, no inclination for business or study. Takes no interest in anything. memory weak.

Gelsemium– Mental dullness, Takes no interest in anything, forgetful, bad effect from fright, fear, exciting news. Stage fright. Along all these symptoms there is great prostration.

Kali brom – Child can pronounce any word told but cannot speak otherwise. Amnesic aphasia

Kali phos– Oversensitive, nervous, delicate person worn out from prolonged mental work, easily frightened, which increases many nervous and mental symptoms. Weakness of memory for words and gets prostration of mind associated with sleeplessness.

Lycopodium – Confused thoughts, spells or writes wrong words or syllables, cannot read what he writes, constant fear of breaking down under stress. Loss of self confidence. Averse to undertaking anything new, he dreads something will happen he fears that he may forget something.

Medorrhinum– Difficulty in concentration, nervous, restless, weak memory, loses the thread of conversation. Time passes too slowly.

Natrum carb– Unable to think, slow comprehension, mental weakness and depression, forgets what he read, anxious and restless from thunderstorm and music.

Natrum mur– Extremely forgetful, unable to concentrate, forgets what she was going to say, loses the thread of what she is hearing or reading, great prostration of mind, ill effects from grief, fright, anger. Depressed, wants to be alone to cry.

Natrum sulph-Ill effects of fall and injuries to the head and mental troubles arises there from. Inability to think and concentrate.

Rhus tox– Incapability of mind for continues thoughts. Writes incorrect figures. If he has to write 25, he writes the figure 2 only. Mental cloudiness.

Tarentula hispanica– Cannot concentrate on any tasks, restlessness, anxiety, child desires to run about, to dance and jump up and down. Suddenly changing moods, fancies or strength. Destructive, throws  things away. Laughs, mocks, runs, dances, jokes, cries, sings till hoarse or exhausted.

RUBRICS OF CONCENTRATION ANFD THEIR RELATED MEDICINES FROM KENT’S REPERTORY-

1.Concentration active: Coff, ox-al, thea.

2.Difficult:Acon ,aesc, aeth, agar, agn, ail, alet, all-c, all-c, alum, ambr, am-c, anac, ang, ant-c, apis, arn, ars, ars-i, asaf, asar, bapt, bar-c, bar-m, bell, berb, bov, brom, bry, camph, cann-i,  cann-s, canth, carb-ac, carb-an, carb-s, carb-v, caust, cent, cham, chel, chin, chi-s, chlol, cimic, cinnb, cocc, coff, colch, coloc, con, corn, croc, cupr, cycl, dros, dulc, elaps, ery-aq, euphr, fago, ferr, ferr-ar, ferr-i, ferr-p, fl-ac, gels, glon, graph, grat, ham, hell, heloh, hura, hydr, hydr-ac, hyos, ign, iod, iris, jug-c, jug-r, kali-ar, kali-br, kali-c, kali-i, kali-p, kali-s, kalm, lac-c, lach, lact, lam, laur, lec, led, lit-t, lyc, lycps, mag-c, mag-m, mang ,med, merc, merc-c, merl, mez, mosch, nat-a, nat-c, nat-m, nat-p, nit-ac, nuv-m, nux-v, olnd, ol-an, op, orig, ox-ac, petr, ph-ac, phos, phys, pic-ac, plat, plect, poth, ptel, puls, ran-sc, raph, rhod, rhus-r, rhus-t, rhus-v, sabad, sang, sarr, sars, sec, sel, senec, seneg, sep, sil, spig, spong, squil, stann, staph, stict, stram, sul-ac, sulph, tab, ter, thuj,til, verat, verb, viol-o, zinc.

3.Morning : Anac, canth, phos.

4.Alternating with uterine pains: Gels.

5.Calculating while: Nux-v.

6.Children,in:Aeth, bar-c.

7.Conversation ,during: Lyc.

8.Crazy feeling on the top of the head,wild feeling in the head ,with confusion of ideas: Lil-t.

9.Interrupted ,if: Berb.

10.On attempting to,it becomes dark before the eyes:Arg-n.

11.Has a vacant feeling: Asar,gels,mez,nat-m,nit-ac,olnd,ran-b,staph.

12.Studying,reading,etc.,while :Acon, aeth, arg, alum, asar, bar-c, bar-m, bell, carb-s, caust, cham, coff, corn, dros, fago, hell, kali-c, lach nat-c, nux-v, ox-ac, spig, sulph.

13.Talking, while: Merc-c, nat-m.

14.Writing, while: Acon, mag-c.

REFERENCE

1. Coleman JC. In: Abnormal psychology and modern life by James C Coleman. Glenview, Ill,Scott, Foresman; 1964.
2. Factors that affect focus and concentration – better mind [Internet]. [cited 2023 Oct 7].Available from: https://www.bettermind.com/articles/factors-that-affect-focus-and-concentration/
3. Trouble focusing: Common causes, related health conditions, and more – blog: Everlywell: Home Health Testing Made Easy [Internet]. Kathryn Wall, Neha miller; 2023 [cited 2023 Oct 7]. Available from: https://www.everlywell.com/blog/sleep-and-stress/trouble-focusing-common-causes/
4. Hahnemann S, Boericke W. aphorisms. In: Organon of Medicine. 6th ed. New Delhi: B. Jain; 2016. p. 94,-249–50.
5. Kent JT. In: Lectures on homœopathic materia medica: Together with Kent’s “new remedies” incorporated and arranged in one alphabetical order. New Delhi: Jain Pub. Co.; 2012.
6. Boericke W. In: Boericke’s new manual of Homoeopathic Materia Medica with repertory including Indian drugs, nosodes, uncommon rare remedies, mother tinctures, relationships, sides of the body, drug affinities, & list of abbreviations. New Delhi: B Jain Publishers; 2007.
7. Kent JT, Nigam H. value of symptoms. In: Lectures on Homoeopathic philosophy: With classroom notes and word index. USA: B. Jain Publishers (P) Ltd.; 2016. p. 239–45.
8. Kent JT, Kent CL, Kent JT. mind-concentration. In: Repertory of the Homoeopathic Materia Medica. Noida: B. Jain Publishers (P) Ltd.; 2016. p. 13.

Shamitha M J
PG Scholar, GHMCH Bangalore
Under the guidance of Dr Shobha.B.Malipatil