Schussler salts are a group of minerals and fine salts that are normally found in the human body and are part of its natural food source. They are essentially micronutrients of cellular food in homeopathic potentiation, usually 6x, for easy absorption by the body.
Schussler salts, also known as biochemical, tissue or cellular salts, are easy to use and are administered either alone or as an adjunct to other methods, enhancing their therapeutic effects. They are also often given as supplements to homeopathic remedies.
The composition of human cells is made up of inorganic and organic components that must be present to ensure the necessary functions of the body, such as respiration, food and fluid intake. Organic analysis of blood and tissues of a healthy organism, as well as breast milk, revealed the presence of eleven minerals (biochemical salts) and many other essential trace elements for the body.
While our cells have the ability to absorb all necessary nutrients needed from our blood, various diseases cause metabolic disorders which in turn leads to impaired health. Stress and various other disorders and diseases of the body also cause metabolic disorders. When the body’s ability to absorb the necessary elements is weakened and there is a lack or imbalance of these elements, the body becomes ill.
Schussler salts are a group of minerals and fine salts that are normally found in the human body and are part of its natural food source. They are essentially micronutrients of cellular food in homeopathic potentiation, usually 6x, for easy absorption by the body.
They enhance the body’s food absorption capabilities and subsequently cover the body’s organic needs. They are given as bodily aid, thus ensuring its optimal function. Some of them act as coordinators, while others as catalysts that activate primary and secondary chemical processes within the cells.
Their proper administration leads to cellular balance and consequently homeostasis and restoration of the body’s health. They are also capable detoxifying agents and contribute to the elimination of useless cellular byproducts. Also, in the dissolution of the congestion of the excretory pathways, which is harmful to our health.
The benefits of using Schussler Salts
The pressures of a stressful lifestyle, such as anxiety, poor eating habits, industrially contaminated food and drinking water, air and electromagnetic pollution and the incomplete detoxification of harmful bodily byproducts, are now major cellular challenges facing even the most health-informed. Therefore, Schussler Salts are essential factors in maintaining our health and our knowledge about them and their benefits is extremely important.
Schussler Salts are ideal for chronic and acute conditions as they are mild and non-invasive. They work immediately, have no side effects, are not toxic or addictive and are therefore completely safe. They are unconditionally administered to everyone, from infants, pregnant and lactating women to the elderly. They work just as effectively in animals. They are economical to buy and use and therefore essential for any home.
Historical References
Dr. Wilhelm Heinrich Schüssler or Schuessler was a German medical doctor in Oldenburg who searched for natural remedies and published the results of his experiments in a German homeopathic journal in March 1873, leading to a list “biochemic cell salts” that remain popular in alternative medicine.
The Schussler Salts were first used by the homeopath Dr. Samuel Hahnemann, 1755–1843. Later they were developed by Dr. Wilhelm Heinrich Schüssler, 1821–1898, also a homeopath, who researched them and turned them into an autonomous therapy system. Schussler began his practice as a homeopath at the age of 37. Since his father was unable to pay for his studies, he worked as a clerk for the Oldenburg City Council in Germany. With great enthusiasm, he trained himself in many fields and with an iron will he studied six foreign languages such as Latin, Greek, English, French, Italian and Spanish which he spoke and wrote fluently.
Schussler was influenced by the theories of some of the great modern physiologists of his day, most notably Virchow & Moleschott, who believed that the key to systemic health was to maintain the body’s cellular health. Then and for the first time, Schussler got the scientific confirmation of what he had long suspected – that is, that disorders at the microorganism level in the body are caused by deficiencies in minerals.
In the 1870s, Schussler studied the components of organs, cells, and tissues from burning ashes and found that the common denominator of all life forms, plants, animals and humans were the 11 cell salts we know today. He found that deficiencies in one or more salts can impair the proper functioning of cells, endangering health and triggering the onset of disease mechanisms in the body. Thus, he realized that the basis of an organism’s health was cell nutrition.
Initially, 12 cell salts were identified and from 1887 onwards, an error correction was performed following Gustav von Bunge’s biochemical cell salt research. Schussler removed calcium sulfide (Calcium Sulfuricum) and from that point on, he worked with 11 cell salts that are fully sufficient to cure all curable diseases without medication. Nevertheless, many today still incorrectly refer to the primary 12 or sometimes even 24 or more salts. Although they call him Schussler, not only is he not, but he is also against his point of view.
Although Schussler was a very successful homeopath for many years, he was not entirely happy with this form of therapy. He was bothered by the random use of remedies that made homeopathy more and more complicated. Thus, as he tirelessly researched the salts, he slowly and steadily moved away from homeopathy.
As time went on his research revealed to him that the clarity and simplicity of the laws of nature in their entirety were obvious. Driven by this, he increasingly sought out effective treatments with narrow boundaries that did not require constant enlargement on a regular basis.
In 1873, Schussler published his first research results on his new therapeutic method, causing a sensation that began a new era. A year later, he wrote in his book “An Abbreviated Therapy” (“Eine abgekürzte Therapie”): “Therapies that have such moving boundaries, allowing them to incorporate new remedies at any time, either retaining or discarding old remedies, cannot provide the certainty that is necessary for the sick and for the remedies to be deemed scientific”. It goes without saying that this statement did not receive the favor of his colleagues in homeopathy.
The differences between cell salts and homeopathy
To achieve an optimal result, Dr. Schussler preferred to administer the various salts in molecular form. The salts are produced according to the homeopathic trituration method, making them easily absorbed by the cells. The fact that salts are pulverized in the same way as homeopathic remedies makes it difficult for some homeopaths to distinguish the difference between the two methods.
The difference lies in the fact that homeopathy tends to use substances that are foreign to the human body, often even poisons. Biochemistry, however, uses only the same structural elements used by the body. This is why biochemistry is referred to as the “method of treating satiety” or “akoria” according to Hippocrates. Dr. Schussler goes on to say that “his method of treatment directly balances the disorders of the body that result from mineral deficiencies, i.e., cell salts, through homogeneous or related substances. On the contrary, homeopathy indirectly achieves its therapeutic purposes through heterogeneous or different substances”.
Facial Diagnostics
In the biochemical method of cell salt therapy, Dr. Schussler repeatedly referred to facial diagnostics, devoting an entire chapter to it in his book, “An Abbreviated Treatment”. As we can surmise, Dr. Schussler was referring to the disease diagnosis based on facial markings. He acquired the basic structure of facial diagnostics on an intuitive level and gave precise and practical instructions. Although he did not make precise statements about individual facial features, he did write about the extraordinary effects that biochemical therapy could have if prescribed according to a person’s diagnosis.
Kurt Hickethier
Kurt Hickethier, a German alternative therapist, took Schussler’s basic ideas and from 1910 onwards, tirelessly and with great dedication, began research into facial diagnostics. It took him at least a decade before his findings were made public. During WW1 he fell sick with malaria and the untreatable Bekhterev’s disease. This enabled him to test the efficacy of the facial diagnosis and cell salts on himself. The disease went into remission and he lived symptom-free for another 40 years.
Hickethier, co-founder of the local Biochemical Association, first performed facial diagnostics with great success in 1921 during “large-scale trials” in Halle on Saale. Facial diagnostics magnetized thousands of people in a short period of time and the number of members of the Biochemical Association increased to about 10,000 members in just one year.
But then difficulties followed with quick succession: Envy and intrigue made Hickethier ’s life difficult, so he eventually turned his back on the Biochemical Association and devoted himself to his work independently and in isolation. Everything that has been published or said about facial diagnostics since 1925 comes directly or indirectly from Hickethier.
What is facial diagnostics?
Individual signs on the face are expressed by altered skin colors, different types of sheen and structural changes in the skin. The most important diagnostic points of the face are the colors and the sheens! These points can be better studied when good daylight conditions prevail. Under these conditions, it is quite easy to delineate the individual types of sheen that are important when performing facial diagnostics. This will make the right distinction between a gelatinous, an oily or some other kind of sheen.
Unfortunately, this can not be done successfully through photography because today’s photographic technology is virtually unable to “capture” these details or transfer these findings from a photograph to facial diagnostics analysis! The only thing a photo can reproduce quite well are some structural changes in the skin which play a minor role in facial diagnostics. So, the use of photos will inevitably create a false facial diagnostics analysis with incalculable damage, since the subsequent prescription will not bring healing! For any serious therapist, reliable identification of facial signs should be of the highest priority and the reason that facial diagnostics should always be done in person.
Hickethier himself gave great importance to the conscientious dissemination of facial diagnostics but mainly through high-quality education. Only highly qualified students who had completed his school’s six-year curriculum were authorized to call themselves “Sonner” (pronounced Zoner). This term in German means “Sun Bearer” and is closely related to the old German term “Gesonntheit” or, in modern German, “Gesundheit” = “health”. Only one “Sonner” was authorized to teach facial diagnostic courses.
Hickethier’s Associates
Dr. Friedrich Depke, Naturopath in Kemmenau, Germany
Faithful collaborators wholeheartedly assisted Hickethier in his work and research. Sisters Luise & Charlotte Depke were his closest associates from the 1930s onwards and were the only ones to remain loyal to Hickethier when he was politically barred from practicing by the National Socialist German Labor Party. His two sanatoriums were confiscated and his books taken and destroyed. In 1947 following dispossession and persecution by the Soviet occupation force in East Germany, he was forced to flee to West Germany. Here he made a new start with his most loyal colleagues and in 1951 he started a new clinic again and he started teaching and healing again.
On February 2, 1958, shortly before the completion of the new center in Kemmenau, West Germany, Hickethier died. Sisters Louise and Charlotte Depke continued his work, staying true to his principles and passing on their knowledge to their nephew and son of their brother, Friedrich Depke. Friedrich, who moved with them at the age of four and was later adopted by his aunt Charlotte, was often ill and though he underwent all possible treatments, the results were disappointing. That changed when he was introduced to Schussler Salts.
Growing up with the knowledge of Schussler and Hickethier, Friedrich decided at an early age to study biochemistry and facial diagnostics so he could help the sick and needy. As “Sonner” he is the legal successor of the authentic biochemistry principles of Schussler salts and works at his world-famous Naturopathy Centre in Kemmenau, Germany with great success. For decades he has been doing his best to teach Facial Diagnostics and Schussler Salts according to Hickethier’s high quality standards. He promotes the dissemination of the therapy and the quality assurance of the salts, so that this healing method and salts are available in a proper way and high quality to the next generations. Possessing the copyrights to Hickethier’s work, he is considered the “Facial Diagnostics and Schussler Salts expert” worldwide.
In 2019, and after a series of comprehensive multi-day seminars, Xenia Ioannidou is the first person of Greek origin to hold a degree in facial diagnostics worldwide. Genuine quality Schussler salts, approved by Friedrich Depke, are available in our online store.
Schussler salts can be used to treat a wide variety of ailments. For details of each salt please see each item in our online E-shop.
Xenia Ioannidou
Founder & Master Teacher of Alternative Therapies
GrecoDow® & GrecoMastery® Educational Systems
