48. a. Man of 55, house – painter, was admitted 27th Feb., 1872. When seen, he was lying on back. Nearly every moment he was seized with shocks which seemed to press from behind forwards, and made him start from his bed. All his muscles quivered, and took up as if under influence of electric current. He complained chiefly of frontal headache, especially on right side. At times, if he is seated or standing, he has dizzy feelings, and then for a few seconds does not know what he is about or who is near; he hesitates, is anxious; he has noises in ears. Sight is troubled, left pupil seems a little larger than right; lids are dropped and raised in rapid alternation. Skin and conjunctiva are yellowish; tongue red and moist; violet line on gums; no nausea, vomiting, or expectoration; dry hacking cough. Appetite is maintained; stools are frequent and loose; urine is amber – coloured, moderate in quantity, free from sugar or albumen. He has no colic; abdomen is supple and without tenderness. He has sharp pains in many of the joints, extending along the limbs. He is seized, momentarily, by strongish cramps in calves, feet and hands; and has formication at all parts of body. The limbs, especially the right arm, are seized with tremors, or rather choreic shocks; and if the arm is raised and bent back to the shoulder, it quivers, and the pain in shoulder increases. The facial muscles also are in agitation. He retains his muscular force, can hold himself upright, but is shaken by frequent oscillations; he walks hesitatingly, tremulously, and does not feel the floor well, having frequently woolly feeling in soles. He sometimes has lightning pains in thighs, from above downwards; also pains as of torsion. Memory is diminished, but intelligence seems unaffected; voice is drawling and jerking, he speaks without force, using several expirations to produce a word. The movements of the tongue also are very slow; the mouth, when he speaks, twists to the right side; he has diplopia in right eye. R. arm shows alternate movements of contraction and relaxation. Thermo – aesthesia is intact, but not so sensibility to touch or to pain. A prick is scarcely felt in right arm, and not at all in left, which is paralysed; on piercing deeper there is just a little sensation on the left side. When, while walking, he closes his eyes, his gait becomes slower, more uncertain and hesitating.
48 b. This man had come under treatment in 1869 for saturnine encephalopathy – his first attack. Then, till January of this year, his health had been good; but at this time he began to suffer from creepings, at first intermittent, then continuous; from arthralgia; and finally from inability to use the left arm. It is 5 – 6 day since he began to suffer from the choreic movements. He was ordered K. brom., which calmed somewhat the jerks, and made his nights quieter. The other symptoms remained unchanged. On examination of chest on March 2nd, heart – beats were heard feebly, as if from a distance, and range of dulness is diminished. He complained then also of a constrictive pain round the waist, not very severe, but which he had had 5 – 6 years. Up to 16th symptoms varied, but showed little real improvement; creepings were very annoying in soles, and he felt as if walking on nuts. From this date, however, there was progressive diminution of pains and jerks, and restoration of motor power; this went on to perfect cure. (Bull. de la Soc. Medorrhinum Hom. de France, xix, 33.)
49. a. In the middle of Dec., 1882, I was called to a married woman presenting some curious symptoms. She had obstinate constipation with colic and retraction of belly; one or two vomitings of food each day; slow and hard pulse; insomnia; anorexia; discoloured skin; and suppression of menses for 2 mos. What struck me most, however, was the foetor of breath and the blue line on the gums characteristic of lead poisoning. She had previously been in a hospital with similar symptoms; had come out improved, but a few day after returning home had fallen ill again. Two of her children were affected in a like manner; the husband, who took his meals from home, was quite well. Under purgatives and tonics these patients recovered, save for some pallor and weakness.
49 b. But now twelve other cases occurred in the same neighbourhood, again among women and children exclusively. Besides the above symptoms, 2 of these presented a severe arthropathy of the knees, anaesthetic patches, and a semi – paralysis of the extensors of the forearm. Later, fresh cases of increased gravity occurred, localising themselves in 3 or 4 houses immediately surrounding that of my first patient. Among these appeared invincible constipation, frightful pains, vomitings, delirium, &c.; there was albuminuria in two cases, and great cachexia; some were even menaced with death. After long search, the source of the plumbic intoxication was found to be a cider sold on the boulevard, prepared in lead – lined vessels, of which all the patients had more or less freely drunk. (L’Art Medical, lvii, 155.)
50. I was called to see a woman, aet. 45, whom I found very much emaciated; face sunken; jaundiced; skin mottled; liver large and tender; abdomen retracted, so that I could feel spine through abdominal walls; constipation; all food rejected by vomiting; most violent pains in abdomen, especially about umbilicus; urine scanty and thick, not albuminous; voice weak and faint. She had been under old – school treatment for 3 mos. Her illness had begun with diarrhoea, which after 2 mos. had been arrested by pills of sugar of lead and opium, with large suppositories of the same. Two weeks after these were begun the present symptoms set in, which had been ascribed to cancer of the liver. Under alum as a chemical antidote, and nux vomica and leptandra for the symptoms, patient completely recovered in about six weeks. (Gumpert, Transl of Pennsylv. Hom. Medorrhinum Soc., 1880, p. 217.)
51. Mrs. M -, aet. 45, cook, was admitted into Ward’s Island Hospital suffering from paralysis of extensors of wrist, complete on left side, partial on r. She complained also of constant severe headache and of slight diarrhoea with moderately severe tenesmus and burning, but no other abdominal symptoms. Plumbic impregnation was revealed, however, by the blue line on the gums, and traced to a repainting of the kitchen in which she worked. After 2 – 3 day exposure to the fumes of the paint her wrists had begun to grow weak, and the other symptoms to appear. Under arsenicum she soon recovered. (Freer, N. Am. Journ. of Hom., March, 1886, p. 312.)
PODOPHYLLUM (See vol. iii, p.679) I. 8. Mr. E. J -, aet. 26, took 10 gr. of 1x trit. ” to stir up his liver.” This was at 11 a. m. About 6 p. m. he was taken with an indescribable sick feeling all over, and a persistent dry – rough sensation in pharynx and oesophagus extending along r. Eustachian tube, with dull aching in right ear; there was also a feeling as though a ball or lump was in upper part of oesophagus. At 8 there was dull stupefying headache, chiefly in forehead, worse on lying down; fulness in region of stomach, with belching of gas and sour eructations; marked salivation; offensive odour from mouth. Went to bed; sleep disturbed and full of confused dreams; rolled and tossed about; bed felt too hard, and gave sensation as if head and shoulders were lying too low. At 3 a. m. was challenged to stool, which was profuse, watery, and dark green in colour. Subsequently frequent call to stool, with peculiar weak dull griping pain below umbilicus, and fulness in rectum before stool and by stool; faint weak feeling in region of stomach during stool, tenesmus and faint feeling after it. These symptoms gradually passed off in course of 2 – 3 d. The looseness of bowels was followed by constipation, which was soon corrected by nux vom. (E. V. Ross, Hom. World, June, 1890.)
9. A gentleman, aet. 25, in good health, took gr. 1/6 – 1/8 of Podophyllin twice daily for a fortnight, and experienced lassitude, nervous depression (especially in m.), vertigo or sense of fulness in head, anorexia, coated tongue, nausea, and occasionally vomiting of mucus and bile, pain in bowels, with copious semi – solid or liquid stools, pale greenish – yellow or brown, which, when frequent, produced excoriation and burning at anus. Three mos. later he took a single dose of 1 1/2 gr., and, besides many of the above symptoms, haemorrhoids and prolapsus ani occurred. I know several patients who always suffer from prolapsus or from haemorrhoids after taking only 1/4 – 1/2 gr. (Phillips, op. cit.)
II. 7. A young man chewed off the end of a root while examining some herbs. Next m. felt well till he ate his breakfast, when he felt nauseated, but gulped up tasteless wind only. His tongue was furred like yellow frost on a board. Heavy feeling in stomach, as if full; it ached and seemed full of gas; he would rub it and try to force the wind out, if he could only pass wind he would (he thought) get relief. Headache through forehead, a dull steady ache, worse from eating; eyelids heavy, with desire to sleep; roaring and crackling in ears; no appetite; thirst, unrelieved by drinking; water tasted brackish; bad taste in mouth – dry, slimy, brackish; weak and prostrated; customary colour gone; blue rings round eyes; aching in knees and up thighs, a dull heavy, indefinite pain; arms and back pained, also loins; urine red and dark. Bowels moved 3 times 1st day; belly felt bloated and ached – a steady ache, relieved for a short time by passing flatus or stool, but coming on again in 5 – 10 m., better from 2:30 to 3:30 p. m., then recurring till after dark, relieved for a short time after eating. Next m. aroused at 4 by urgent desire for stool, which gave him scarcely time to hurry out of bed; stool was thin and watery, whitish, no pain. Another stool at 7:30. After breakfast pain commenced, griping, doubling him up for a m. Stool recurred every 1 1/2 hours, with spasmodic attacks of pain after each, and in intervals (3 – 4). At noon stools became dark brown and watery, recurring every 2 h. Next day there were 3 stools, partly liquid. Though weak he soon recovered. (Monthly Hom. Rev., xxxiii, 688.)
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.