PULSATILLA


Homeopathic remedy Pulsatilla from A Manual of Homeopathic Therapeutics by Edwin A. Neatby, comprising the characteristic symptoms of homeopathic remedies from clinical indications, published in 1927….


      Pulsatilla, including P.paratensis. P.nigricans, and P. anemone vel. P. nuttalliana, the last an American variety. N.O. Ranunculaceae. Syn. : Meadow anemone. Pasque flower. Wind flower. Tincture o the entire fresh plant when in flower. The plant pulsatilla contains a crystalline alkaloid, anemonin, which is present in greater amount in P. nigricans than in P. nuttalliana.

PATHOGENESIS.

      In experiments on animals, 9gr. of anemonin killed rabbits in three or four hours. The heart’s pulsations were diminished in strength and frequency and respiration was slowed; finally, diarrhoea, stertorous breathing, sinking of temperature, semiparalysis of the lungs and death in stupor occurred. at post- mortem the heart walls were relaxed and the heart full of black, clotted blood; there were congestion and oedema of the lungs, and marked hyperaemia of the membranes of the brain and cord, especially in the neighborhood of the medulla oblongata.

Our knowledge of the range of action of pulsatilla has been obtained from the provings on healthy human beings. It acts on all the mucous membranes of the body and produces thick, bland discharges. it acts also on the synovial membranes, on the veins, causing varicosis, and on the generative organs of both sexes. It affects the special organs of sense, the eyes and ears-causing inflammation of those organs-and produces an itching eruption on the skin. The influence of pulsatilla on the organism is extensive but not lethal, and its inflammations do not progress to deep, destructive lesions.

THERAPEUTICS.

      General characteristics.- Pulsatilla has a wide range of action and ranks as a polychrest. It is nevertheless a medicine of marked individuality, and seems to have been a favourite with Hahnemann, who has very carefully defined its place as a drug. He laid special stress on the mental and emotional alterations in the patients for whose complaints it is suitable. He notices that in these patients there is ” a timid lachrymose disposition, with a tendency to inward grief and silent peevishness, or, at all events, a mild and yielding disposition. It is therefore specially adapted for slow, phlegmatic temperaments… It acts best when there is a disposition to chilliness and adipsia.” it is particularly suitable for “women whose periods are habitually some days late, and where evening aggravations are prominent, and the patient cannot fall asleep for some hours after going to bed. It is useful for the ill-effects caused by eating pork.” In this passage hahnemann gives several of the leading characteristic of pulsatilla, but others may be added. We may, for instance, note the changeableness of the pulsatilla symptoms, viz., changeable mood, waywardness, the pains shift their place, are now here, now there, the patient requires to change his position frequently, the stools very in colour and consistency, pain and swelling leave one rheumatic joint and go to another, gonorrhoeal discharge will leave the urethra and epididymitis or orchitis will develop, there may be metastasis of mumps to the testicles or mammae, the dry night cough changes in the morning to one that is loose with profuse expectoration, hemorrhages stop and come on again. In keeping with this is restlessness with desire to keep moving about, and the patient is relieve by movement provided it is slow and gentle; vigorous movement aggravates.

Another characteristic of pulsatilla is venous engorgement, and a general relaxed state of the veins, from which varicosis results; haemorrhages are dark and passive, and mucous discharges are copious, thick, bland, and of yellow-green colour. This condition of venous relaxation seems to be the cause of another characteristic of this drug, viz., that the patients cannot bear warmth, and are better from cold air and cold applications. Warmth increases the relaxation of the veins, while cold braces them up. The pulsatilla patient will never sit over a fire, wants the windows open, and loves to go for a walk on a cold day, and to bathe in cold water. However, with all his preference for cold he feels chilly, but warm clothing and a warm room do not relieve him; he gains relief from slow walking in the open air, as the venous circulation, the sluggishness of which is the cause of his chilliness, is stimulated thereby.

The pulsatilla patient tends to be fat, lethargic, and easily perspires on exertion. The sweat has a musty odour, and may be partial or one-sided. Pains are drawing or tearing, and flit from place to place, or they are bursting or expanding, and are then relieved by firm pressure. A patient typically hypersensitive to pulsatilla, as far as bodily appearance goes, is one with fair hair, blue eyes, pale face and inclined to embonpoint.

Bearing the above characteristics in mind, we can now proceed to consider for that complaints pulsatilla is likely to be suitable prescribed.

Mind.- In states of melancholia it will be indicated when the disposition is timid and gentle, with great inclination to weep when the patient is telling his symptoms, when he is fearful in the evening, anxious and irresolute, and when the mood alternated between mildness and ill-humor and discontent. The corporeal symptoms indicative of pulsatilla should be present with the above mental state for it to be a certain remedy for melancholia. Epilepsy, when the fits have depended on absence or irregularity of the menses, has often been cured with pulsatilla, and it is equally useful for chorea, and for pseudo-paralysis arising from disturbance of the sexual organs. Other mental disturbances for which it should be considered are puerperal insanity, the weak-minded state after acute confusion, adolescent instability, sexual obsession and early dementia praecox.

The headaches for which pulsatilla is the remedy are congestive headaches, usually associated with stomach disorders, or occurring in connection with menstruation. They are mainly in the forehead, temples and sides of the head, and are often unilateral. The pains are mostly constrictive or bursting, pressing outwards, with vertigo and feelings of heat; they are aggravated by moving the eyes, looking upwards, from stooping, lying and sitting quietly, and ameliorated by the application of cold, by pressure, such as bandaging, and by moving about slowly in the open air. When the headache precedes menstruation, as it often does, it is relieved by the onset of the flow. Those arising from stomach disorders are caused by eating rich food, cream, pork, or form overloading the stomach, and they are often accompanied by sour vomiting

Eyes.- Pulsatilla is a well-established remedy for conjunctivitis when the discharge is profuse, thick, yellow and bland, and agglutinates the eyelids at night, with burning itching of the lids, provoking rubbing and scratching, and when there are lachrymation and dimness of vision, as from a fog or veil before the eyes. It is useful for styes, especially for those of the upper lid, and for twitching of the eyelids. The eye affections are better from bathing, whether with warm or cold water and from open air, but cold air and wind cause lachrymation. It has been used for ophthalmia neonatorum and strumous ophthalmia when there is not much photophobia and the discharge is bland and profuse.

Ears.- In the ears pulsatilla causes a stopped-up feeling, with dulness of hearing or a sensation as if the membrana tympani were being forced from within outwards, or there are shooting pains. Various snapping, whistling, roaring and ringing sounds re heard. it is very useful for inflammations of the middle ear, whether acute or chronic, with or without perforation of the drum, for earache in children, worse in the evening and on going to bed, and for catarrhal inflammation of the meatus, with bland, itching, purulent discharge.

Nose.- The coryza for which pulsatilla is indicated is when there is frequent sneezing, loss of smell and taste, the nostrils are sore and the alae nasi raw, the discharge is yellow-green and may become offensive. The nose becomes stopped up in the evening, and in a warm room. There may be epistaxis. In chronic cases there is blockage of the posterior nares, and hawking of masses of thick mucus and crusts in the morning. The patient feels better in the open air, can breathe better there, he sneeze much in a warm room. Nasal catarrh occurring with every menstrual period, and epistaxis before or during the menses, or when they are suppressed, require this remedy. The blood, when there is epistaxis, is dark, almost black, thick and clotted. Pulsatilla may be called for in hay-fever, when the coryza alternates with menstrual disorders.

Digestion.- In has great influence on the mucous membrane of the alimentary tract, which it inflames, and on this account is a frequently employed remedy for gastric catarrh, especially when caused by overloading the stomach with unsuitable food, such as pastry and food containing much fat or fruit. There are nausea and a flow of sweetish saliva into the mouth, and a flat, bitter, acid, sweetish or slimy taste. The tongue is coated with a dry, white fur, it smarts at the edge and there is a sensation in the middle of the dorsum of the tongue as if burned. An offensive odour arises from the mouth. Food, especially bread, tastes bitter. Sharp, shooting pains occur in the teeth, or a drawing and jerking, “as if a nerve were put on the stretch and then suddenly let loose”; the toothache is worse in the evening and at night, from the warmth of the bed (cham.) and when eating, is better in the open air, from throwing off the bedclothes, and from holding cold water in the mouth.

Edwin Awdas Neatby
Edwin Awdas Neatby 1858 – 1933 MD was an orthodox physician who converted to homeopathy to become a physician at the London Homeopathic Hospital, Consulting Physician at the Buchanan Homeopathic Hospital St. Leonard’s on Sea, Consulting Surgeon at the Leaf Hospital Eastbourne, President of the British Homeopathic Society.

Edwin Awdas Neatby founded the Missionary School of Homeopathy and the London Homeopathic Hospital in 1903, and run by the British Homeopathic Association. He died in East Grinstead, Sussex, on the 1st December 1933. Edwin Awdas Neatby wrote The place of operation in the treatment of uterine fibroids, Modern developments in medicine, Pleural effusions in children, Manual of Homoeo Therapeutics,