There is a widespread use of homeopathic treatment for eczema: about one child in five who attends a homeopathic practice suffers from eczema. Quite strikingly however, until recently, almost no data were available on the efficacy or effectiveness of homeopathy for this disease. A new high-quality study demonstrates that the results of homeopathic treatment are similar or even superior to conventional treatment.

As a part of a larger study examining the influence and costs of homeopathic versus conventional treatment of adults and children with various specified chronic diseases, this study was conducted by a team of researchers from the Institute for Social Medicine, Epidemiology and Health Economics at the Charité University Medical Center in Berlin, sponsored by one of the German sickness funds. This observational study (a prospective, multi-centre, parallel-group, comparative cohort study) is the first long-term prospective investigation to compare homeopathic and conventional treatment of eczema in children.

A total of 118 children with eczema were included in the present study: 54 were treated homeopathically and 64 conventionally. The children and their parents were recruited at the homoeopathic or conventional doctors’ practices and had thus already made their own choice of preferred therapeutic approach.

Over a period of 12 months, eczema symptoms and eczema-related quality of life as assessed by patients or their parents improved under both homeopathic and conventional treatment. However, while according to the physicians’ assessment the eczema signs/symptoms improved in both groups (p < 0.001 for each group, both adjusted and unadjusted), the extent of the improvement was significantly different in favour of homeopathically treated patients (p < 0.001, both adjusted and unadjusted).

The chosen study design reflects regular primary health care, where patients with chronic diseases often make choices of their preferred treatment, thus providing a more realistic picture of eczema therapy than can be expected from a randomized controlled trial (RCT). However, to assess the efficacy of homeopathy as a treatment option for eczema, large RCTs are also necessary (they have not been conducted successfully so far). Results from prospective cohort studies, such as the current one, supplement rather than challenge the findings of RCTs. One concern in non-randomized observational studies is bias. To reduce hidden bias to a minimum due to patients’ self-selection, the authors assessed possible differences between treatment groups at baseline as well as between patients lost to follow-up and those with complete data first, before performing multivariable analyses to adjust for potentially confounding factors.

An important feature of this study was that the reference therapy was not placebo, but rather the conventional therapy as prescribed under regular primary health care conditions by a conventional practitioner of the patient’s choice. Conventional therapy can therefore be regarded as an active control. The authors conclude that, in view of the unclear mechanism of homeopathic treatment, it is noteworthy that the outcome was at least similar (by parents’ assessment) or significantly superior (by physicians’ assessment) to conventional treatment.


Dr. Ton Nicolai
European Committee for Homeopathy (ECH) President