online homoeopathy

Medical science databases were already being set up in the very early years of electronic data processing, but scientists today have an ability to access all the latest developments and research which could hardly have been imagined. For online data bases alone, the total information pool relating to medicine is reckoned to amount to more than 100 million references.
Despite this huge quantity of information a data enquiry which concerns literature of homoeopathy or complementary medicine will often prove fruitless. In contrast to conventional medicine, homoeopathy makes special demands on literature documentation. Whereas in allopathy the current status of research represents the most important criterion, homoeopathy also depends on old literature from as far back as the 19th century. At the end of 1992 HomInt decided they would fill this gap with the HomInt Document Information System (HomInt DIS). The plan was to develop a system that would meet the requirements of primary literature and cover current developments and research. The necessary planning and construction work has been shared between DHU-Arzneimittel GmbH and Co. KG in Karlsruhe and VSM Geneesmiddelen bv in Alkmaar. Primary literature can be filed as complete original texts, important articles can be presented as facsimile and publications or books displayed as bibliographical references. The combination of MeSH-thesaurus (descriptors used in Medline) and specific keywords for homoeopathy is available online for the characterisation of documents. At the moment the HomInt data base holds more then 30,000 documents. This includes papers from the most important Dutch, German, British, French and American journals with approximately 23,800 data records, the majority bibliographically indexed back to the earliest issues (see table 1). The keywords in the data records are being completed at VSM Geneesmiddelen bv. The data base is being updated regularly since 1994 with subject-specific excerption and indexing of literature from other periodicals relating to homoeopathy.
 In the field of primary literature the data base has been complemented by full texts of the 350 most important homoeopathic remedies. The indexes of the most important materia medicas also permit a direct access to remedy pictures archived in the libraries. Furthermore, all recent DHU and VSM Geneesmiddelen bv libraries acquisitions and publications are entered progressively into the system. The cataloguing of the entire library is expected to be completed by the end of 1996. A homoeopathic thesaurus for general application is being set up as a part of a project of the European Committee for Homoeopathy, Documentation Subcommittee.
online homoeopathy : Arjo Bol
 VSM Geneesmiddelen bv
 Documentation Services
 Postbus 9321
 1800 GH Alkmaar, The Netherlands
 or
 Susanne-Monika Rehm
 DHU-Arzneimittel GmbH and Co. KG
 Documentation and Library Services
 Postfach 41 02 80
 76202 Karlsruhe, Germany      Homoeopathy journal