Urtica urens. Small Stinging-nettle. (Urtica dioica, the Common Nettle, has similar if not identical properties.) N.O. Urticaceae. Tincture of the fresh plant in flower.
Clinical
Agalactea. Anemia. Bee-stings. *Burns. *Calculus, *prevention of. Deltoid, rheumatism of. Dysentery. Erysipelas, vesicular. Erythema. Gout. Gravel. Hemorrhages. Intermittents Lactation. Leucorrhoea. Menorrhagia. Phlegmasia dolens. Renal colic. Rheumatism. *Spleen, *affections of. Throat, sore. Uremia. Urticaria, nodosa. Vertigo. Whooping-cough. Worms.
Characteristics
Burnett may be said to have rediscovered Urtica as a remedy. The history of how he came to use it (*Gout, p. 33) is one of the most fascinating passages of his works. As a remedy for a fit of the gout the discovery is entirely his own, and the result of great therapeutic acumen. Its use in gravel and urinary affections is very old. “Being eaten, as Dioscorides saith, boiled with periwinkles, it make the body soluble, doing it by a kind of cleansing faculty: it also provoked urine and expelled stones out of the kidneys: being boiled with barley cream it is thought to bring up tough humors that stick in the chest.” Gerarde, from whom I quote, mentions these other uses: (1) The juice inserted into the nostrils stops nose-bleed, it is “good against inflammation of the uvula.” (2) Pleurisy, pneumonia, whooping-cough. (3) Antidote to Hemlock, Mushrooms, Quicksilver, Henbane, Serpents, Scorpions. “The leaves or seeds of any kind of nettle,” says Gerarde, “do work the like effect, but not with that good speed and so assured as the Roman nettle” (*U. pilulifera). “A bundle of nettles,” says Cooper, “applied to a rheumatic joint or part, has long been a favorite country remedy. A leaf of the nettle placed on the tongue and pressed to the roof of the mouth stops bleeding from the nose.” Burnett’s tincture is made of the small nettle, *U. urens, which is the correct one in homoeopathy. Burnett had used *Urt. u. a good deal in spleen affections, and found patients under its use often passed large quantities of gravel. To a middle-aged maiden lady who had enlarged spleen, and “who smelled so strongly of nettles that it almost nauseated me whenever it was my duty to examine her,” Burnett gave *Urt. u.. While taking it she passed large quantities of gravel. But this did not attract much notice, as the lady was in the habit of passing considerable quantities of *gravel with her motions. Localized abdominal pain preceding such an occasion by a number of days. The painful spot, just under her spleen, she called her “gravel-pit.” Putting this and other points together, the fever-action of *Urtica among the number, Burnett concluded that *Urtica was a remedy for acute gout, which would cut short the attack *”in a safe manner, namely, by riding the economy of the essence of the disease product, its actual suffering-producing material.” He usually ordered five drops of the tincture in a wine glassful of quite warm water every two or three hours. Under its action the urine became more plentiful, dark, and loaded with uric acid. Burnett remarks of the nettle that it springs up everywhere near human habitations, and he has noticed it flourishing more by the side of ditches which carry off fluid sewage, “thus possibly living to some extent on uric food.” A very severe case of uremia was cured by him with *Urt. His discovery of its fever action was through the cure of a lady patient of his of ague (which he had not succeeded in curing) by drinking nettle-tea on the advice of her charwoman. *Urt. ur. was his sheet-anchor in cases of the fevers of the East India, Burma, and Siam. This action of *Urtica, as well as its anti gout action, I have had abundant opportunity of verifying. Urtica causes fever as well as cures it, and one of Burnett’s patients was obliged to stop taking it: “It sets all my pulses beating, makes me terribly giddy, makes me feel as if I was going to topple (forwards) on my head, and then a bad headache comes on, and when I take it at night, it makes me very feverish.” When she took the dose in the morning she did not have the fever, and Burnett says, “The fever of gout generally comes on *at night.” He has often cured vertigo with *Urt. The provings of *Urtica are not very extensive, but supplemented by clinical observations, the picture is fairly complete. Headache, with spleen pain, rush of blood to head, soreness of abdomen,, dysentery, burning and itching of anus, oedema, urticaria, rheumatic and gouty pains, and fever were all evoked. Among the rheumatic pains a pain in the right deltoid muscle is very striking. The relation of this symptom to Burnett’s use of *Urt. is illustrated by the case of Dr. W.H. Proctor (*A. H., xxvii. 126). The doctor was suddenly seized with agonizing pain in right deltoid muscle, due, he believed, to retention of uric acid in the system. Hypodermic injections of Morphia and Atropia had to be resorted to. Then followed, for three weeks, scanty, pale urine, sour sweat, sleeplessness, restlessness, nervousness, loss of appetite, almost constant pain in deltoid with great soreness and lameness of the muscle, an intense sensation of general sickness and weakness *with continued fever. Nothing did any good. Finally there appeared: An intense burning sensation in the skin after sleeping: *he was afraid to go to sleep for fear of the suffering. *Urt. ur. was now taken. After three doses he drifted into a quiet, refreshing sleep of two or three hours and woke absolutely free from all skin irritation. The nerves were quieted and all symptoms passed away. Soon after, Proctor had an opportunity of curing a patient of lameness of the deltoid of some standing in the same expeditious way.In this case there were no additional symptoms. J. Left Nottingham (*H. R., xv. 244) treated (1) Mrs. W., 38, tall, slender, with auburn hair, for eczema vulvae with violent itching and burning, swelling and thickening of labia, smooth, pale, dry appearance of the mucous surface, a dry, scaly, fissured appearance of labia majora and skin. Thirteen years before, she had a sinus from the right ovary emptying into the uterus. (The husband had sycotic warts on the glans penis.) *Urt. ur. 1 x relieved all the symptoms and removed sexual excitement induced by the itching and uncontrollable desire to rub. (2) Mr. N., 21, had swelling, stinging, burning of face, hands, and feet, with redness. Rubbing with finger-tip would leave a white line for some time. When out in the cold, damp, snowy air, hands, feet, and face became purple red, puffed, and stinging cold, going into a warm room he had increased swelling, stinging, itching all over him, especially of hands and face. *Urt. ur. relieved in twenty-four hours. In four days he returned home better than he had been for years. (3) A woman with a lump in her left breast of some years’ duration, was seen six weeks after childbirth, complaining of stinging pains in that part, entire absence of milk, stinging pains in whole right lower limb, with great soreness and singing pains accompanying movements involving muscles of left side of head, cervical vertebrae, sacrum, and upper limbs, front of chest and both breasts, especially the left. She was very despondent. *Actea right relieved her, but the improvement ceased after a week. *Conium improved the difficulty in moving the head but not the other symptoms. *Urt. ur. was given, and after three days the breasts filled with milk and the pain was relieved. The breasts had now to be supported on account of their fullness. The right leg became natural. The action of *Urt. in causing flow of milk has been often confirmed. In the case given in Allen it caused swelling of the breasts and profuse flow of milk in a woman years after the birth of her last child. Urt. is one of the best remedies for burns of the first degree, used locally and given internally. Gerarde mentions its antidotal action to snake-bites. A writer in *Monats. f. Hom. of July, 1900 (H. Envoy, xi. 51) says *it is the specific for bee-stings. An application of the tincture even on the most sensitive parts of the face or eyelid gives instant relief. In cases of stings about the eyes the application may have to be repeated every five minutes, and a compress must be kept on all night. Eclectics regard “profuse discharge from the mucous surfaces” as a specific indication for Urt. In Sweden nettles are regarded as a remedy for anemia, and fresh nettles are cooked and eaten like spinach for the purpose, or a nettle-tea is prepared from dry nettles. The juice of nettles with sugar is in vogue for hemorrhages of all kinds. *Sensations of Urt. are: As from a blow in the eyeballs. As of sand in eyes. Muscles of right arm as if bruised. Burning, stinging, itching, and soreness are the principal pains. The right side very much affected, but also the left hypochondrium (spleen). The symptoms are apt to return at the same season every year. The periodicity is a point in the correspondence of *Urt. to ague. The periodicity is a point in the correspondence of *Urt. to ague. The symptoms are worse by touch, lying on arm. worse Violent exertion (hemoptysis). Lying down causes soreness of bowels, better nettle-rash. Burning in skin is worse after sleep. worse From application of water. (In the one observation with *U. crenulata, an attack like lockjaw was induced in a man who lightly touched the plant, and this was renewed for some days in full force whenever *he put his hand in water.) worse Exposed to cool, moist atmosphere. Some new symptoms of Burnett’s I have marked (B) in the Schema.
