General Action
It produces paralysis of voluntary motion, then of respiration. The brain is benumbed; vertigo, dilated pupils and even convulsions follow.
Generalities
Trembling, especially of the arms. Convulsions, with danger of suffocation. Great weakness and loss of power, even to paralysis. Sudden giving-way of muscles when walking. Takes cold easily. Easily overstrained. Relaxation of all the muscles in the legs, and difficulty in walking; cannot control movements, must lie down. On walking, a tendency to fall forward on the knees, with heaviness, giddiness. Tremulous weakness, especially after stool, (>) open air. Dullness of all the senses. General aggravation at night and during rest.
Mind
General aversion to being with people, and yet afraid of being alone. Frightened at night. Inability to sustain mental effort. Mental operations are slow and difficult; stupidity; difficulty in understanding what is read. Loss of memory. Clinical. Melancholy; quiet, sad, picks his fingers, makes short answers; or this condition alternates with excessive gayety. Hypochondriasis, especially resulting from excessive venery. Averse to people, yet dislikes to be alone. Melancholia, resulting from suppression of menses; aversion to members of her own family. General mental weakness; inability to get the mind fixed on his business or to stand any prolonged mental effort.
Head
Headache in the morning, as if head were too full and would burst. A general feeling of heaviness. Vertigo in the morning on rising, or on walking. Paroxysms of tearing pains in the head, with nausea. Sensation of a large foreign body in the right half of the brain. One side of the head feels numb and cold. Brain seems very sensitive to noise.
Clinical. Vertigo is a common accompaniment of the Conium condition; especially aggravated on motion, such as turning over in bed or rising up; this vertigo is sometimes accompanied by partial paralysis of the muscles of the eye, or objects seem to be unsteady; especially indicated in vertigo of old people; vertigo resulting from excessive use of tobacco. With the head symptoms the brain is frequently extremely sensitive, with feeling of a hard jump in the brain, or of numbness or coldness in the head or one side of the head.
Eyes
Burning in the eyes in the open air, or a feeling of coldness. Aching in the eyes when reading. Lids seem pressed down and heavy, almost like a sleepiness. Burning on the inner surface of the lids. Vision weak, with dazzling, vertigo and general debility; legs will not support him. Power of accommodation very much impaired or lost. Vision double.
Clinical. Valuable for partial or complete paralysis of the ocular muscles, especially of the internal rectus; the attempt to fix the eyes upon any object seems painful and may even cause vertigo, hence many symptoms, of letters running together, vanishing of vision, etc. This drug is very valuable in numerous forms of scrofulous ophthalmia, in a general way indicated by extreme photophobia, greater than the apparent inflammation would warrant. There is general aggravation at night on lying down, especially of ulcers of the cornea. Adapted to old people; it has proved beneficial in cataract when the above symptoms were present.
Ears
Tearing, sticking pains in the ears and about them. The ears feel stopped, with more or less roaring in the ears. An unusual accumulation of blood-red wax in the ears. At times the hearing becomes painfully acute.
Nose
Smell particularly sensitive. Clinical. The patient is inclined to pick at his nose, which bleeds easily and becomes sore (in melancholia). It has been prescribed for polypus of the nose. Purulent discharge from the nose.
Face
Heat of the face. Face puffy, pale blue. Tearing pains through the face, especially at night.
Mouth
Drawing pains in the hollow teeth, (<) cold food. Speech difficult. Articulation imperfect. Bitter taste. Tongue swollen, stiff or painful.
Throat
Irritation, provoking hacking cough.
Stomach
Loss of appetite. Empty eructations. Sour eructations after eating. Offensive eructations. Efforts to vomit, with entire loss of appetite. Nausea from all food. Constrictive pain in the epigastric region, gradually extending to left side of abdomen, with nausea. Pain in the pit of the stomach, extending to throat, as if a ball rose up. A feeling of soreness in the stomach. A feeling of distention of the stomach and upper abdomen after taking milk.
Clinical. Gastralgia, especially with spasmodic cough (stomach cough). Sometimes spasmodic constriction of stomach and oesophagus, as if a round body ascended from the stomach. The symptoms of pain, of vomiting, etc., have led to the use of Conium in cancer of the stomach and liver.
Abdomen
Tremulous feeling in the abdomen. Cutting pains. Sticking pain in the region of the liver, or under the ribs both sides, (<) motion; (<) at night when lying down and on inspiration. Tearing pains in the hepatic region. Constriction of the hypochondria as from a band.
Clinical. Hard swellings of the liver have been cured (note the sticking, tearing pains in the hepatic region). Enlarged mesenteric glands and tumors in the abdomen have been treated successfully (note the great sensitiveness of the abdomen, the swelling and the character of the pain, knifelike).
Rectum and Stool
Heat in the lower part of the rectum; also during stool. Sticking pains in the anus when not at stool. Diarrhoea watery, frequent, with many empty eructations and copious urine. Involuntary stools during sleep. Constipation, with ineffectual straining. Clinical. Chronic diarrhoea of old people, with tremulous weakness; discharges sometimes involuntary; specially indicated by the symptoms that the flow of urine is intermittent. In obstinate constipation, especially if it sometimes alternates with diarrhoea, the stool followed by tremulous weakness. Evacuations of undigested food, with colic. Useful for the diarrhoea of pregnant women.
Urinary Organs
Micturition frequent at night; sometimes involuntary, or with dribbling after micturition. A burning in the urethra during and after micturition in the morning. Cutting in the urethra when urinating. Urine turbid, whitish and thick. Urine bloody. Micturition frequent at night. A feeling of pressure on the blander.
Sexual Organs, Male
Lack of sexual power, with exaggerated sexual desire. Erections incomplete; of very short duration. Excessive emissions. Emissions on the slightest sexual provocation. Emissions without sexual dreams.
Sexual Organs, Female
Menstruation too early, but scanty; sometimes suppressed. During menstruation, painful cramps in the abdomen. Irritation in the vagina, deep. Leucorrhoea follows menstruation, preceded by colic; accompanied by weakness and paralyzed sensation in small of back and weakness; consisting of white, acrid, burning mucus, or sometimes thick and milky; with contractive, labor-like pains from both sides.
Clinical. Useful in the bad effects following excessive venery, sexual weakness or impotence; flow of prostatic fluid, with constipated stool or on the slightest motion. Enlarged testicles, which are very hard, especially following injuries. It also has been found useful for the sexual nervousness of strong, healthy men, who are unable to have an erection. In both sexes useful for the effects of suppressed sexual appetite; for instance, collapse, hysteria, melancholy, etc. Uterine polypi. Uterine haemorrhages, with pain in the uterine region, running down thighs, etc. Dysmenorrhoea; menstruation too scanty and too early. Numerous accompaniments of the menses; gastric or mental symptoms. Pruritus of the vagina and pudenda following the menses excessive hyperaesthesia of the genital organs, especially in suppression of menses. Useful in various indurations and tumors in sexual organs, especially in the cervix; particularly with burning, stinging or knifelike pains. Leucorrhoea following the menses, excoriating and burning; sometimes bland in children. Mammary glands indurated, with sharp, knifelike pain. Numerous symptoms of the mammary glands preceding the menses, viz: swelling, sharp pain; aggravation of the tumors at the menstrual period.
Respiratory Organs
Tickling in the larynx as from a dry spot, which causes almost constant dry cough. Scraping in the larynx, with irritation to cough, and dry cough in the evening. Cough on first lying down, day and night; must sit up and cough, after which he has rest. Cough (<) lying down; almost constant before going to bed. Cough sometimes loosens something, but it cannot be expectorated until later. Suffocative cough, with flushes of redness in the face.
Clinical. Very valuable for tormenting night cough of the people; it is usually dry; they can expectorate a little only after coughing a long time; the cough is caused by a dry spot in the larynx, aggravated on lying down at night; is accompanied by suffocative attacks; the usual indication is that the patient is unable to expectorate the little mucus which seems to be loosened, it must be swallowed. Asthma in old people. Stomach cough; it seems as if the cough came from the abdomen; he must hold the body tight. Occasionally whooping cough. Irritation, reflex cough of pregnancy. Whooping cough when the spasms occur at night.
Born in 1837in Westminster, Vermont. . He was an orthodox doctor who converted to homeopathy
Dr. Allen compiled the Encyclopedia of Pure Materia Medica over the course of 10 years.
In 1881 Allen published A Critical Revision of the Encyclopedia of Pure Materia Medica.