The Sehgal Method

Dr.M.L.Sehgal and his genuine work known as Sehgal method has become an icon in
the homoeopathic world.
Dr.Sehgal had a passion for doing things with perfection. Initially he was attracted
towards homoeopathy after he had seen some good results in cases treated by a
homoeopath. He became curious after seeing the amazing work of small pills. He started
studying it as a hobby. Later it became his passion.. He had started treating family
members and close friend to gain practical experience. He used to discuss his cases
with reputed homoeopathic doctors of his time. Though he was getting miraculous
results but was also failing in many cases. He had a feeling that somewhere something
is lacking.
Why it is so that in some cases we get wonderful results and in other we fail miserably?
Why it is that we are not able to apply hearing law in each and every case. ?
He thought that if it is a law it has to be applicable in each and every case, like the law of
gravity.
Why patient feels hesitant to approach in homoeopathy straight away after knowing his
problem?
He started studying further in search of some more vital clues. He looked into journals,
encyclopedias and other available literature.
Incidentally while treating a boy of 10 for high fever on alternate days. Dr.Sehgal
observed that child liked to remain in bed, not complaining about anything, and on
asking how is he? , boy replied, He is well. Dr. Sehgal used to read and apply some
rubrics from the mind section of Kents repertory. He had no clue how to use these
common, usual symptoms like desire to remain in bed, not complaining, saying well he
is even when sick, He had prescribed Hell., opium., and Stram. the remedies for
painlessness of complaint but no medicine worked on him. Then he had a fresh look at
the case and on the basis of the following rubrics:
INDIFFERENCE, complain does not
WELL, says he is when very sick
BED, desire, to remain in
Hyos became the indicated remedy, which was administered in 30th potency with
astonishing results. The boy recovered with a week after getting 2-3 milder attacks. He
passed loose stool at the end of the final attack. The recurrence of the fever stopped
thereafter.
That was the turning point in his practice. Encouraged by the above result he started
observing such symptoms which seems to be common, ordinary and usual symptoms
representing the mental state of the patient during the sickness. He also started
understanding the meaning, interpretation and applicability of mind rubrics.
According to Dr.Sehgal a patient knowingly or unknowingly can speak anything related
to his / her problem. He / she could start telling what could be the uppermost in his mind.
Like he / she straight away start telling a physician about pain, loss of sleep, loss of
appetite, or about social problem / business / work / domestic life / married life etc. He /
She will express in a plain way. We have to observe, What he says How he says, Why
he says, and When he says.

Let us take an example. We often come across this common question from patients,
How long will the treatment last?
This question has annoyed us sometime or the other in the beginning of our practice.
Some patients put this question on the very first day others put it after they have
received treatment for sometime. What a silly question? How on earth can a patient
expect his physician and specially a homoeopath to tell him how long will his treatment
last. They come to us with the feeling that homoeopathy is an eradicative therapy and
can cure but still worry about the time it will take for the complete cure.
Later on as we went on practicing this system more and more we tried to really
understand our patients.
First thing we tried to understand was that these common remarks are coming from a
layman who has no knowledge about medicine. Secondly, when a patient is asking a
physician about the duration of his treatment there must be some kind of doubt /
confusion / fear / anxiety etc in his / her mind.
Instead of getting annoyed with his question, we try to understand his concern behind
this question, how long does the patient have to take the treatment might not be an
important question for a physician but it could be very important for the patient.
Somewhere in his mind some sort of doubt / fear / anxiety etc are bothering him more
than the pain, difficulties, desires, aversions caused by his problem. Some of the
common expressions I got from my patients are:
1) With great annoyance in his voice a patient says, Already so much time has
been wasted. I have tried allopathic, homoeopathic even ayurvedic treatment but
from no where have I got any relief. I doubt if you would be able to do anything
DOUBTFUL, of recovery
2) Patient says, I have already spent so much time and money on the treatment. I
am worried about how much more I will have to spend on it. FEAR,
extravagance of
3) Patient says, I am concerned about it because if it doesnt get cured soon then it
might lead to some bigger problem in the future. ANXIETY, future about
4) Patient says, If I know when I would get better then I could organize things in my
life and plan accordingly for the future. LIGHT, desires for
5) Patient says, I always have a fear in my mind that things may go out of hand in
case they are not treated properly and timely then it will be too late and no other
option would left for me. FEAR, betrayed of being
6) The same question is asked by a patient after sometime has passed in the
treatment. He says something likes, Its been many days; I feel it should end
now, it become boring. ENNUI
7) He adds, I want to discontinue your treatment at once. He has enough of it and
is now averse to any more treatment. DISGUST
Similarly in other situation when a patient asks the doctor, I am not getting any relief.
Should I go for X- ray, ultra sound or blood test? I may have some serious problem
like cancer.
There will be patients who just before the case taking make an inquiry Do
homeopathy medicine aggravates the disease? I have heard this about
homeopathic medicine like that it first aggravate the disease. It may be good but I am
scared of it, so please do not give me medicines which can cause aggravation.
There are some patients who require a guarantee, which a physician can not give
and then that makes them hesitant towards homeopathic treatment.

These are the PRESENT, PREDOMINATING, and PERSISITNG mental states of

the patient.
Every word of the patient is to be weighed, evaluated and interpreted in the language
of rubrics and then out of them the present, predominating, and persisting are to be
sorted out to make a basis for prescription.
So instead of explaining the meaning of the rubrics Dr. Sehgal preferred to convert
the expressions of the patients into the rubrics as they appear in Kents repertory
For example
Take the case of a house maid, she was separated from her husband and had two
children totally dependent upon her. After getting frequent attacks of malaria, she
became depressed. She had high fever and she was worried that she couldnt afford to
fall sick so often, as no body will pay her for the period of her absence from work. She
wept at her helplessness.
WEEPING, sad thoughts
HELPLESSNESS
It led to the medicine Stram. 30 was prescribed. The lady was out of the grip of the fever
within a few days.
A girl of 19 used to have attacks of urticaria with high fever. She was hospitalized twice
for the severity of the attacks with grave prognosis. The doctors feared that attacks of
severe intensity at short intervals could endanger her life. She said, I was expecting the
attacks anytime and I did not like to attend college because of unwarranted remarks
from my classmates. She further said that she was averse to any kind of work except
sweeping the floor. She reserved this job for herself for the fear of infection. She could
not rely upon other do it as well. Desire for amusement was also present in her.
FEAR, infection of
AMUSEMENT, desires for
Lach 30 was prescribed to her. This time attack came with lesser intensity and for
smaller duration and then it never came again.
What is revolutionized method, and why is it named so?
A ) What is the change ?
Simply put, it is emphasizing on mind symptoms and prescribing only according to them.
Classical method also agrees that if we have dependable mental symptoms we can
ignore the physical ones. According to them, the mental symptoms are not to be found in
every patient. It is at this point that revolutionized method differs from it in the concept. It
observes that no individual at any given time is without any mental state. If a person
requires medicine, that is, if he is sick, it is not necessary that he must be angry or
weepy or anxious. He may be a normally behaving person covered by the rubrics like
cheerfulness, ecstasy, exhilaration etc. Here we will take up one of Dr.M.L.Sehgals
case of a priest (religious head) who ran a big ashram in London. He was suffering from
allergic asthma. My brother wrote to me that he is a devote of an ashram and wants his
priest to be treated by me, because the priest finds a lot of difficulty in his meditation and
in conducting havan (a ritual in Hindu religion performed around the fire through
offerings of butter, oil, grains and perfumes, to various Gods and Goddesses). I told my
brother, let your priest write to me in his own hand in a simple way and then contact me
on the phone after a few days for a few minutes to me. Priest wrote his case history
giving all the symptoms of allergic asthma. He wrote, Although I am quite indifferent
towards feelings of love or hate, since I have renounced everything in this world, I still
feel a little uneasy when I find obstruction in the performance of my religious duties. I

asked him only one question Does the obstruction cause any effect on your state of
mind and force you to abandon your routine work, rituals, prayers etc?
He said, Now I have come to accept it as a reality, which perhaps I have to live with,
and I dont allow anything to obstruct me in the performance of my religious rites. On the
following rubrics:
1) RECOGNISE, everything , but cannot move
Original rubric in Repertory (RECOGNISES, everything, but cannot move,
recognize (catalepsy).
2) INDIFFERENT, lies with eyes closed
Cocc. Ind. 30 was prescribed in three small doses, to be taken after 15 minutes interval.
It is now been about a decade since the priest had not had anymore attacks of asthma.
The priest was so grateful that he propagated the news of his recovery among his
followers spread all over the city of London.
What I want to emphasize through this example is that it is the present mental state, in
whatever form and style it may be present which is important and need be given
attention.
B) How to select a remedy?
Since the mind is a vast field, for the purpose of selecting a remedy we must select from
the present mental state, persistent and predominant symptoms, which I call signals.
C) What is the meaning of P.P.P.?
What persists is that which is trying to settle permanently, what predominates is that
which is the uppermost and all powerful. In other words it does not allow other symptoms
to raise their heads. In the case of priest, at times there may have been many thoughts
in his mind about his sickness yet one final thought, of identifying and accepting the
reality, was predominant. Let me tell you here that this phenomenon has a scientific
background. It is the powerful that prevails, in the criteria of so called infection. If a
person is already suffering from a powerful infection no infection weaker than that, like a
seasonal fever etc. can have any effect on him. In other words if he is suffering from a
disease which is less powerful than another infection which invades his body later, the
former will get subdued and the later will predominate and will require to be treated first.
And only when the system is cleared of the powerful infection the weaker of the two
infections will present it and demand treatment.
D) Case taking and implementing P.P.P.
For selecting a remedy, treat a patient like a computer in human frame that emits signals
in the form of speech and action, which when combine, form expressions. Convert these
expressions into the language of rubrics as listed in the repertory, in the mind section. In
other words it is decoding and deciphering the signals of mind in a mechanical way. It is
as if the data has been pre- fed by whatever order or disorder is going on in the body
and the computer is throwing this data on the surface. Why I call it mechanical is to
guard you against becoming emotional at the time of case taking. The patient may
abuse or misbehave with you in the worst manner but you must remain detached and
then react to his behavior. Your relation is exactly like the one between a meter and a
meter reader. The job of the meter reader is to concentrate, and try his best to read the
meter accurately remaining objective all the time.
E ) When not to prescribe?
I am of the opinion that before a doctor examines a patient he should check whether he
himself is fit to do the job well. As in judicial norms, it is well known that a judge should
make judgments only when he is in a normal mood, i.e. only when he is in a balanced
state of mind. In the same way a doctor should also be in a normal frame of mind when
he prescribes medicine. We have many rubrics like:
1) GROPING, as if in the dark

2) CAPRICIOUSNESS
3) CONFUSION
4) CALCULATING , inability for
If the physician is himself under the influence of any of these mind rubrics, he should not
expect himself to be capable of selecting the right medicine. The right course for him in
such a situation will depend upon the type of patient he is dealing with. If you feel that
the patient is co-operative, you can tell him the truth that you are not in the right frame of
mind at that moment, requesting him to come on the next day or at any other suitable
time.
You will win his respect. He will be assured that he is in proper hands. The second
course is to send the patient back with placebo i.e. blank pills, with the instruction to
report on the next day so that you have the time to study his case with a clear and stable
mind. The third option is for the patient, who is in a relatively serious condition. If the
patient really cannot wait you can request him to consult someone else following these
three norms will never let you down in your practice. So while you have to be mechanical
in your approach you also have to use your intelligence to understand the symptoms of
the patient accurately. To conclude, the main criteria is to arrive at the indicated remedy
with the help of the tenets of the present, predominating and persisting symptoms
without any bias or prejudice, that is without considering its grade as given in the
repertory, ignoring things like whether the remedy is short, or deep acting and whether it
covers any miasm.
According to the experience of Dr.Sehgal, if the selection of the medicine is correct, it
must act in two ways:
1) First action
2) Second action
The first action is instant relief in any kind of physical and mental pain or discomfort.
The second action is the reversal of the original complaints.
The relief under the first action may last for only a few seconds, minutes, hours or days
and it is sometimes here that we are required to be very careful, because it is the first
action that gives the indication whether the remedy prescribed is right. If the indication of
the first action is missed it might happen that the effects of second action mistaken for
the signs of the first mislead you into changing the medicine or raising its potency. As a
result the case might take a wrong direction from the very beginning.
The second action is quite opposite to the first one because the ailments, on the basis of
which the medicine was prescribed, come back. Here you have to think whether the
return of the complaint is due to the advancement of the disease or it is the curative
action of the medicine as part of the total curative process. To verify this, first of find
out what happened to the symptoms of mind on which the medicine was prescribed. For
example earlier at the commencement of the treatment your patient had in his psyche
one of the rubrics IRRITABILITY pain, during. You should investigate whether there is
now any change in his present state of mind. Usually, under the second action the
patient says he has no relief. Do not take him on his word. You have to remind him,
Last time when you came to me you were weeping and were very annoyed. Today you
dont seem to be so. Likewise on your previous visit you were not walking as easily as
on you are now.
The discipline followed by the second action.
Its duration: The second action follows a fixed discipline.
It lasts for a fixed period of an odd number of days, usually 3.The middle day is the peak
day.

Discharging of the toxic matter:

The other thing that is expected from the process of second action is the discharge that
may take place from any of the five natural outlets nose, mouth, anus, urethra and
skin. This means if the deposit of the toxins is in the head, the nose is its natural outlet. If
it is in the liver or in the respiratory system or stomach its exit is mouth, if the toxin is in
the intestine it gets discharged through the anus, if it is in the urinary tract it finds an
outlet through the penis and if under the skin it comes out in the form of some sort of
skin eruption.
In revolutionized method we need to identify drugs as individuals, especially in those
cases where three Ps have many drugs. For example the rubric LIGHT, desires for, has
many drugs placed under it and unless we know their distinguishing features it is difficult
to identify the medicine indicated. Obviously it makes the selection quick, easy, and
sure. In actual practice we have three ways of selecting a remedy:
Translating three P.P.P. expressions of a patient into the rubrics of mind.
Comparing remedies placed under a common rubric, with each other as stated
above.
Observing a patient as an individual independent and free from any connection
with other drugs keeping in view his established and unchangeable disposition.
We have no hesitation or doubt in saying that no one would ever come so close to the
genius interpretation that Dr. Sehgal has given us. For example:
DELIRIUM, fear of men, with
What is the fear here?
It is a feeling of discomfort experienced at the thought of something harmful or
dangerous.
Of : This is the source. In this case that source is men and not women.
Men: This word denotes strength, power.
So this patient fears from anything which has the power to hurt or harm him.
For example it could be the fear of sticks, punishment, or muscles.
So this rubric has qualified the situation of fear. And it is the source of the fear that is
more important here. It may be the story of a man working in an office where his
colleagues are cooperative but he does not share their view and has a constant fear of
them. If he shares their activities then there is an ultimate fear of the law and if he does
not then he fears they may harm him and therefore he has an inclination to escape.
Another example:
DELIRIUM, terror expressive
Delirium is a state of mind which shows derailment, derangement, or being off track. The
person is in his senses but the tone and style of expression is exaggerated which stress
and indicates abnormality of the mind.
Terror:
It is something that has the power to frighten the mind very badly.
Expressive:
Coming out of internal feelings to the surface. Through gestures and speech, revealing
the inside of ones mind.
So after getting a slightest jerk under the influence of fright, the patient according to this
rubric go into a state of delirium, showing a great disturbance in the functioning of his
mind.

Another example:
SITS, and break pins
Sits: Sitting is a position which falls between the position of rest (free from any worry)
and walking (being in motion).
This rubric denotes a persons helplessness where he is compelled to give up working.
He is like a defeated solder finding him in effective in the present struggle for existence.
But there is a protest that is going on in his mind. This protest finds an outlet by
avenging itself on things which are inanimate, lifeless, and cannot offer resistance.
Breaks: Divided into pieces by applying force accompanied by the desire to destroy
things.
Pins : Things that bind different things together , which arrange union for promoting
peace even among opposing forces. The other meaning is to plug ones teeth hard on to
something and to grind it, because the person can find no other way to emit the venom
from his mind. Here we can say that the person is refusing to be consoled and is trying
to kill the one who is consoling him and says, the wearer knows where the shoe
pinches.
Frequently asked question
There is a question frequently asked about the word REVOLUTION. What is new in
applying mind symptoms? For some, it is an old concept which they have always used in
their practice.
Please understand the word Revolution. It does not denote any kind of revolt against any
existing literature that our Masters have given to us. There are many practitioners who
were / are using mind symptoms along with physical symptoms in their cases. Dr.
Sehgal has mentioned in his book No. VII , page no. 14 , that we simply read the dial (
mental state ) which indicates the medicine. But while assessing the progress of healing
process we should also consider the anatomy, physiology, pathology and the latest
upper most mental state. This is because diagnostic investigations, especially those
relating to the vital organs which are not visible i.e. of the lungs, liver, kidney, heart etc.
require such data to properly assess the action of the medicine. Sometimes it has been
observed that in spite of the best overall progress, the particular diseased organ shows
no improvement. For example there was a case of a lady who had the problem of
twitching eyelids. The lady regained her overall efficiency, her sleep become normal her
appetite and routine elimination became normal and regular but the problem for which
she had come to me in the first place remained for a long time. It means that the
medicine was acting only partially and not covering the whole.
For further reference please read the book Rediscovery of Homeopathy series I X.
From: Dr. Sanjay and Yogesh Sehgal