CLASSIFICATION AND VALUE OF RESEARCHES AND TESTS OF HEPATIC DYSFUNCTION.


Liver is at the same time purifier, fixer of toxins, and transformer of foods which it degrades to seperate from them the products which are to be excreted and those that will be necessary for the economy of the organism….


Classification and Value of Researches and Tests of Hepatic Dysfunction.

Numerous techniques have been suggested in different times in order to characterise the functional troubles of the liver and specially to put in evidence the insufficiency of the liver. In reality these methods are after deficient and difficult to apply in current practice and even the results given by the tests are far from having an absolute value. A large number of functions of the liver will require numerous biological examinations if one wishes to be complete.

Moreover for each function there are many experiments from which it is difficult to chose one.

1. Biliary Function. It is classical to say that one can put in evidence the troubles of biliary functions by the verification of urobiline in excess in the urine, but at present it is disputable and all the authors do not admit that urobiline is due to a cellular lesion of the hepatics; it is rather due to the obstruction of the biliary duct.

Another test is proposed by Prof. Chiray who recently, with the collaboration of his two collaborators, Milorde Molochewich and Marcel Kipler, has tried to determine the importance of the hepatic cell by studying the variation of biliary salts in the bile sucked out directly by duodenal tubage.

2. Protidic Function. Intestinal diastasis have disintegrated the big molecules of proteins into albumen and in peptones, then into polypeptides and finally into amino acids. It is with these acids hepatic cells may reconstitute the albumen meant for the organism and for the surplus they disintegrate the nitrogenous matters that pass to the phase of dissemination, then by the ammonia phase, in order to become urea one may note the hepatic function by searching in the urine or in the blood the quantity of nitrogenated residues which are not completely transformed into urea. Formerly Albert Robin measured the co- efficient of nitrogen by the formula : nitrogen of urea in the urine divided by total nitrogen of urea. Then he finds out the co-efficient of nitrogen of Maillard and the co-efficient of acidosis of Lanzenberg modified by Derrient and by Feissinger.

Even one can find out the quantity of residual nitrogen in the blood, or even the polypeptides and the amino-acids in the blood. There are a considerable number of examinations proposed for the dosage of all the compounds of nitrogen in the blood.

In order to understand at the same time the functional importance of kidneys and of the liver of almost all the persons suffering from chronic diseases after 40 years of age, I always do systematically chemical examination regarding the quantity of residual nitrogen, uric acid, chlorides, cholesterin and lipides in the urine. It is above all interesting to note the relations that exist between urea and cholesterin, as well between cholesterin and lipide. This helps to understand the so numerous cases of toxaemia due to the slowness of the nutritive function and function of the excretions.

3. The anti-anaphylactic function may be compared with periodic functions, thanks to which the liver holds the incompletely disintegrated proteid substances. Some classical examinations such as digestive hemolysis, examination of the milk, may put in evidence the troubles of that anti-anaphylactic function.

4. Glycogenic and glycopexic function. It helps the liver to transform the glucose into glucocin and to conserve it and to distribute later on according to the need of the organism. One can put in evidence the troubles of this function by different tests, such as provoked hyperglycemia and specially thanks to glycosuria, hinted at first by Bauer. This test has a great importance specially in the research of hepatic insufficiency in surgery.

5. Anti-toxic function. The liver fixes and neutralises the toxins in order to eliminate them in the form of soluble products passing through the kidneys. It is proposed to put in evidence this function by the examination of glycoronuria provoked, or by the measure of the oxydation of urinary Sulphur. These examinations are difficult to realize in current practice.

6. To that anti-toxic function one may compare the chromatogenic function of the liver which consists in the elimination by the liver some colouring substances as for example phenol-tetrachloride, phtalein, carmin-indigo, azoburine, Bengal rose, phenolchloresulpho-nephtaleine.

7. The blood function or function of the liver on the coagulation of blood, is at present disputable. It is not yet known whether fibrinogen is due to hepatic cells.

Some authors distinguish even at present the martial function, formation of the reserves of iron in the liver, in order to distribute it for helping the red globules.

Many clinicians were struck in all the countries by the weaknesses of the experiments on which is based the diagnosis of the hepatic insufficiency (Cheray). However it is necessary to look for the cases of latent hepatics, if not, one may risk submitting the patients to surgical instrumentation which become mortal in cases of undetected hepatic insufficiency. It is for this reason it is necessary to treat before, after the intervention of surgery, the patients who have clear symptoms of hepatic insufficiency found out by different experiments specially by galactosuria.

We are now going to pass in review the important remedies of morbid temperaments of hepatic dysfunction.

3. Remedies of Morbid Temperaments of Hepatic Dysfunction. Let us first of all think about the function of the liver in the organism.

The gland is at the same time purifier, fixer of toxins, and transformer of foods which it degrades to seperate from them the products which are to be excreted and those that will be necessary for the economy of the organism.

It is therefore an organ of the first importance in the cycle run by the substances that the living organism borrows directly or indirectly from the mineral kingdom.

“The living matter is composed of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, to which are added chlorides, potassium, sodium, calcium, magnesium, iron and accessorily the silicum and fluoride (Lambling). The other minerals are less important, at least quantitatively.

The carbon is borrowed by the living matter under the form of carbonic acid, hydrogen in water state, nitrogen from ammonia state, sulphur in the state of sulphuric acid.

As a consequence of the different operations for reduction and synthesis, the living matter builds from the organic substances some complex organic matters, proteins, fat, hydrate of carbon, combined with some mineral substances (chloride, sodium phosphate, potassium, magnesium etc.) for obtaining the immediate principles constituting the tissues and the organs of the living matters. The simple substances will generally be the homoeopathic remedies of the first importance.

Thus we find the three principal minerals, which are the principal remedies of liver : Sulphur, Natrum, sulphuricum and Phosphorus. Besides there are three other remedies.

Lycopodium. A vegetable substance, containing Sulphur and even Natrum sulphuricum in sufficient quantity and also some Phosphorus.

Sepia, Lachesis. Animal products, they are very complex but they are less important than the 4 other remedies.

Ammonium carbonicum. The important remedy of uremia as well as Phosphorus to which it is related, is not a ground remedy because it is hardly prescribed in high dilution, but it is better to mention it here.

Now we will understand well the value of remedies of mineral origin for the treatment of troubles due to hepatic insufficiency. Lycopodium, which contains, Sulphur, Natrum sulph, and some Phosphorus, will be the remedy of the first importance in the hepatic insufficiency.

After these three minerals we may consider that the important remedies of morbid temperament in the dysfunction of the liver are the same as those that will be indicated in all the affections of the lesions of the hepatic cells. Let us mention here that there is not a difference in the degree of intensity of symptoms observed between functional troubles and impairment of the organ.

It is necessary to consider, in my opinion, 6 principal remedies of morbid temperament of the hepatics.

Three minerals : Sulphur, Natrum sulphuricum, Phosphorus.

One vegetable : Lycopodium.

Two animal products : Lachesis and Sepia.

Sulphur does not play in the treatment of the diseases of liver as important a part as that of Lycopodium, Phosphorus, Natrum Sulphuricum. However suits well to some troubles co- existing with an active and transitory congestion of liver, or with general arterial congestion. Arterial hypertension. By extension and localisation, hypertensions in the sphere of veins (portal), veins of the lower cava and of abdominal veins and its branches. This General Abdominal Congestion may be one of the symptoms of a tendency towards cancer with localisation in the abdomen. Bleeding Hemorrhoids, incessant or periodical bleeding, are clear symptoms of Sulphur. This flow of blood is a Real Safety Valve of a Psoric State or often plethoric.

Mauritius Fortier-Bernoville
Mauritius (Maurice) Fortier Bernoville 1896 – 1939 MD was a French orthodox physician who converted to homeopathy to become the Chief editor of L’Homeopathie Moderne (founded in 1932; ceased publication in 1940), one of the founders of the Laboratoire Homeopathiques Modernes, and the founder of the Institut National Homeopathique Francais.

Bernoville was a major lecturer in homeopathy, and he was active in Liga Medicorum Homeopathica Internationalis, and a founder of the le Syndicat national des médecins homœopathes français in 1932, and a member of the French Society of Homeopathy, and the Society of Homeopathy in the Rhone.

Fortier-Bernoville wrote several books, including Une etude sur Phosphorus (1930), L'Homoeopathie en Medecine Infantile (1931), his best known Comment guerir par l'Homoeopathie (1929, 1937), and an interesting work on iridology, Introduction a l'etude de l'Iridologie (1932).

With Louis-Alcime Rousseau, he wrote several booklets, including Diseases of Respiratory and Digestive Systems of Children, Diabetes Mellitus, Chronic Rheumatism, treatment of hay fever (1929), The importance of chemistry and toxicology in the indications of Phosphorus (1931), and Homeopathic Medicine for Children (1931). He also wrote several short pamphlets, including What We Must Not Do in Homoeopathy, which discusses the logistics of drainage and how to avoid aggravations.

He was an opponent of Kentian homeopathy and a proponent of drainage and artificial phylectenular autotherapy as well.