Boger's Synoptic Key

the repertory of choice to express the 'genius' of the case

The Genius according to Boger is:

The strain which runs through every pathogenetic symptom complex...
To give this its proper place in the prescription should be the ideal of every prescriber

This new fourth edition of the Synoptic Key is herewith submitted to all brothers in the work. Only changes of proven value in coordinating and assembling the significant features of seemingly disassociated symptom groups, have been made. Upon these depends almost wholly the final choice of the simillimum. They should reflect a speaking image, as it were, of the correctly indicated remedy. The symptom features of many remedies have been clarified in order to increase their usefulness, especially in precisionizing differentiations. The repertory is only intended to orient the searcher.

Cyrus Boger

Terminology
- Synoptic means to be able to take in all the information with one sweep of the eye.
- The gestalt pattern is the established remedy picture of a certain remedy.
- The clinically confirmed essence or nucleus of the overall gestalt picture which has been established for many remedies over decades is termed the Genius of the remedy.

Boger’s synoptic key - How the repertory is arranged

MODALITIES
- CAUSATION. TIME. TEMPERATURE. WEATHER. OPEN AIR. POSTURE. MOTION. EATING AND DRINKING. SLEEP. IF ALONE. PRESSURE. TOUCH. DISCHARGES.
MIND:
- IRRITABILITY. SADNESS. FEAR. PLACIDITY.
SENSATIONS:
- BURNING. CRAMPING. CUTTING. BURSTING. SORENESS. THROBBING. THIRST.
OBJECTIVE ASPECT:
- DEMEANOR. RESTLESSNESS. NERVOUS EXCITABILITY. FACIAL EXPRESSION. TORPOR. SECRETIONS. COLOR. ODOR.
PART AFFECTED:
- Organs. Right. Left.

THE SYNOPSIS is intended to make clear the general expression or genius of each remedy, and thereby help the prescriber correct his bearings. The scope of its contents is much enlarged by bracketing the most nearly affiliated remedies after some of the more important symptoms; this also helps in making differentiations. What often makes a cure hard is the laying of too much stress upon some particular factor at the expense of the disease picture as a whole, thus destroying its symmetry and forming a distorted conception of the natural image of the sickness [I.E. relying on keynotes]. This does not, however, mean that all symptoms stand on the same level, for certain effects must be more prominent than others, yet be part and parcel of them. This is the sense in which we must learn to know our remedies, just as we do our friends, by their air or personality; an ever changing, composite effect, but always reflecting the same motive.

Cyrus Boger