2 b. In a former proving of the drug, the symptoms were somewhat dissimilar. Then I took smaller doses, and continued the drug for more than three weeks. When I commenced to take it then, I was suffering slightly with ovarian pains. These were allayed upon first taking the drug, and a degree of sexual feeling was excited. After taking the drug for a few days, the ovarian pains, accompanied with uterine pains and severe, excoriating leucorrhoea, reappeared, and the sexual feelings were entirely extinguished. This time the ovarian and uterine pains, with the sexual passion, were developed at the beginning, and gradually increased to the end. These symptoms have been most severe and almost unendurable. The pains in my back, womb, ovaries, and breasts continued unabated for several day, until my menstruation came on, which was too early and for one day very profuse; then it almost stopped. Before, it came on 4 day too early, was natural in character, too profuse, and lasted too long. This condition of irregularity lasted for several months. During the later stages of the former proving I was much more nervous than now, and had much less control of my muscular movements. The leucorrhoeal discharge was also worse. There were other differences, mostly in degree, which I cannot enumerate. (Ibid.)
OPIUM (see vol.iii, p 459)
I. 36. A lady informed me that whenever she took laudanum it caused dull aching in nape and occiput, feeling of a band round neck, with sensation as if throat would burst, and as if blood were rushing into head. There was also sickness, constant retching, food vomited at once; she was light – headed and sleepless. Next day perfect prostration. (Morphia had same effect upon her, only with more sickness and prostration.) (Berridge, The Organon, iii, 284.)
II. 22. A man had taken by mistake a preparation of O. intended for external use. After 5 hours he was found lying on his back, face pale and slightly livid, features drawn, eyelids closed; no expression of suffering; complete relaxation, limbs remaining wherever placed; somnolence, from which he was with difficulty drawn. Sensibility was much blunted; pupils very contracted, punctiform; pulse about 100, small and compressible; beats of heart distinct but enfeebled; temp. 38 o; no nausea or spontaneous vomiting. The most remarkable phenomena were those of the respiration, which was reduced to 5 or even 4 in morning; then, after a long pause of absolute apnoea, one heard a rattling or stertorous sound accompanied by a slight elevation of the chest and a semi – inspiration, which was followed, without interval, by a deep and full, but single one. The slower the breathing the more marked the pallor and lividity of the face. Electricity (induced current) through phrenic restored and maintained the respiration, and in 12 hours patient had completely recovered. (Arnould, Bull. Medorrhinum du Nord, 1879, p. 51.)
OSMIUM (see vol.iii, p.533)
II. 5. a. H. B. -, aet. 38, platinum refiner, consulted me Dec. 13th, 1883, for a troublesome rash on face and upper extremities, which had been there for 3 mos. He had always been in good health, and had never had syphilis. He had been following the same occupation for 5 years, and in it had on several occasions been exposed to the fumes of osmic acid. He had continued well till 2 years ago, when he had a similar though less severe eruption on the skin, accompanied by intense smarting of eyes (1 – 2 hours after exposure to fumes), relieved by open air, but leaving eyes weak for a day or two, so as to prevent reading, all objects seeming surrounded by a coloured halo; eyes were red and swollen. There was also severe irritation of larynx and trachea; tongue was furred, and sensitive to hot and cold drinks; he had colicky pains in abdomen and evanescent attacks of indigestion (to which he had never been accustomed); tendency to piles; pain in loins, the beginning of an acute nephritis, for which he was confined to bed for 10 day, urine being at first scanty and of colour of porter. Health about that time and since very variable; some day he would feel perfectly well, and on others very miserable. This attack lasted 2 mos. It may be interesting to note that patient has 4 children, of whom the 3 elder are perfectly healthy and free from all skin affections. The youngest, a boy of 15 mos., is suffering from eczema at the present time.
5 b. The present attack began 3 mos. ago, with redness and swelling of the skin of hands and arms, which showed a crop of small pimples, accompanied by intense itching and becoming gradually vesicular. The rash, which is confined to the face, neck and forearms, is seen on examination to consist of numerous isolated patches of vesicles situated upon an elevated base, which latter is hard and brawny, and pits slightly on pressure; towards the edges the patches consist of only one or two vesicles on the summit of a large papule. The contents of these vesicles are in all cases watery. There is occasionally cracking of the affected skin, and constant slight oozing. The itching is at times almost unbearable, and causes him to be much more irritable and short – tempered than has been his wont. The eyes are slightly suffused and irritable, and the sight is weak. The tongue is clean but deeply fissured in places, and in one spot appears denuded of epithelium over a space 1/2 in. in length and 1/8 ion. in breadth. (J. G. Blackley, Monthly Hom. Rev., xxviii, 170.)
6. J. B. -, a fellow – workman of the above, came with a similar history. He had been employed at intervals for three years, and after exposure to the osmic acid fumes experienced same effects upon eyes and larynx, and at times noticed that skin of face was red and tender, and covered with ” fine pimples with watery heads.” The hands and arms remained free till 3 mos. ago, when some large pimples showed themselves upon the knuckles, and gradually spread over hands and arms. At present hands and forearms are covered with large circular or elliptical patches, varying in size from that of a sixpence to that of a florin. The patches are red, slightly raised, and covered with scabs arranged in a concentric manner, resembling the later stages of herpes iris. Most of the patches are deeply fissured. He has also one or two large papules on the neck. The patches are intensely irritable, especially on rising in m., and on stripping at n. On examining eyes with ophthalmoscope veins at fundus are found to be large and tortuous; retina is otherwise normal Refraction plus 1.5 spherical. (8 Ibid.)
PARAFFINUM [Paraf].
General symptoms
A tasteless, inodorous, fatty matter, resisting action of acids and alkalies, obtained by dry distillation of wood, peat, petroleum, &c. (It is probable that paraffin is, for medicinal purposes, identical with petroleum, and that its effects may be used as indications for that drug. We have thought it better, however, to present them separately. – Eds.)I. 1. In the Hom. Recorder of Sept., 1890, there is a copious ” pathogenesis ” of P. from the pen of the late Dr. Wahle. It has the dubious features of all documents of the kind from this source, and can only be indicated here. – Eds.
II. 1. a. Mrs. A. M -, aet. 36, came to the Royal Infirmary at 9:55 a. m. on March 15th, 1890. She stated that she had been drinking for a fortnight, and that that m., while still not thoroughly sober, she had intentionally drunk a good half – cupful of paraffin oil. The time could not be accurately ascertained, as her clock had stopped, but it seems to have been before 6 a. m. After about 1/2 hours had elapsed she began to suffer pain and to vomit; she vomited twice or thrice, a mouthful or two at a time, and on the first occasion she says there was more than a tablespoonful of blood in the vomited matter. (During the previous week she had had several attacks of vomiting, due to drinking, but no haematemesis and no pain.) The pain increased rapidly, and became so bad that she thought she was going out of her mind. On admission her hands and tongue were very tremulous; the tongue was distinctly red and glazed – looking at the tip and edges, and the dorsum covered with a thick white fur. The right pupil was somewhat dilated, the left normal; both reacted rather sluggishly to light. She complained of pain in the pit of her stomach. Temp. 98.6 o F., pulse 120. One tenth of a grain of apomorphine was given hypodermically, 6 m. later she vomited about 6 oz. of matter which emitted a strong odour of paraffin. It consisted almost entirely of yellow mucus floating in a golden – yellow fluid. She then drank a large cupful of water, and thereafter the dose of apomorphine was repeated; 2 m. later she vomited material similar to the last, but diluted with the water just swallowed. There was no blood on either occasion. About mid – day she passed a scanty stool, consisting almost entirely of red blood. Her menstrual period had ceased normally almost a week before, but there occurred a slight return of the flow that d. At 1 she was ordered a simple warm water enema (a pint and a half), to be repeated after an hour’s time. On each occasion the enema brought away a stool having an intense odour of paraffin, but containing no blood. She passed 12 oz. of urine, which also had a very marked odour of paraffin; by allowing the urine to stand the paraffin was rendered visible, floating as a thick scum on the surface. At 7 she complained of abdominal pain. Another warm – water enema was given, and brought away a stool without any blood; the odour of paraffin was present to a less degree than before. Shortly after this she passed 40 oz. of turbid urine, lighter in colour, but with a marked odour of paraffin. The temp. at 4 p. m. had been 100.2 o, but at 8 p. m. it was a degree lower. Mr. Charles Arthur, the dispenser to the Royal Infirmary, kindly undertook to distil 10 oz. of the first sample of the urine, and 10 oz. of the second. As the result of distillation and redistillation about 6 c. c. of pure paraffin were collected; and Mr. Arthur estimated that at least an equal quantity was lost in the process, owing to the want of sufficiently delicate apparatus. The two samples were kept separate during the first distillation, and it was found that the first contained about twice as much paraffin as the second; thus a total of at least 25 c. c. of paraffin must have been excreted by the kidneys.
Hughes was a great writer and a scholar. He actively cooperated with Dr. T.F. Allen to compile his 'Encyclopedia' and rendered immeasurable aid to Dr. Dudgeon in translating Hahnemann's 'Materia Medica Pura' into English. In 1889 he was appointed an Editor of the 'British Homoeopathic Journal' and continued in that capacity until his demise. In 1876, Dr. Hughes was appointed as the Permanent Secretary of the Organization of the International Congress of Homoeopathy Physicians in Philadelphia. He also presided over the International Congress in London.