MEDICINES



The most characteristic mental symptom is a bewildered state. A number of cases of tobacco poisoning producing heart symptoms and dropsies have been cured with this drug. It belongs to the same natural order as Strophanthus.

Apocynum has been almost exclusively used in the lowest potencies. According to Dr. Jones, watery infusions with just enough spirit to keep them from fermenting are the most efficacious in dropsical cases.

ARNICA.

The chief indications for the use of Arnica will be found in the history of injuries, strains or over-exertion. Heart affections in athletes will require this remedy.

Characteristic symptoms are :-“Bruised pains in the chest, and compression;” “Palpitation;” “Painful pricking in the heart, with fainting fits;’ “Cough with expectoration of blood.” Most suited to plethoric red-faced persons.

ARSENICUM ALBUM.

“Great oppression at the chest.” “Violent and unsupportable throbbing of the heart, chiefly when lying on the back and especially at night.” “Irregular action of the heart, sometimes with anguish.”

“Shivering or great heat and burning in the chest.”

Arsenic is called for in many conditions of weakened or degenerated heart. In order to secure its full action the constitutional indications for the drug must be present, or at least some of them. Great chilliness; desire for warmth; unquenchable thirst for small quantities frequently. Burning pains. Anxiety, restlessness, and excessive anguish which allows no rest, principally in the evening in bed, or in the morning on awaking, and often with trembling, and cold sweats; oppression of the chest; difficulty of breathing, and fainting fits. Unhealthy, dry, scurfy skin. Effects of over-indulgence in alcohol or tobacco.

Many cases of angina pectoris and fatty heart will need this drug. It affects the left heart more especially (Phosphorus the right).

ARSENICUM IODATUM.

As many of the cases narrated in this work were treated with Iodide of Arsenic, it may be well to state here how I first came to use it.

As far as I recollect, it was from observing the marked improvement in the heart symptoms of patients suffering from both pulmonary and cardiac disease, when I had been led to choose the medicine from the lung symptoms alone. Believing that the improvement was due to the direct action of the salt on the heart, and not to its action on the lungs only, I next gave it in cases where the lung symptoms were not such as would call for it, and then I found its action on the heart was just as marked and just as beneficial as in cases of pulmonary and cardiac disease combined.

Our provings of the salt are very scanty, and beyond irregularity of the pulse, noted by one of the provers, there is nothing in the pathogenesis of the Iodide that would lead us to suppose it had great power over the heart. But the clinical experience of its action in cases of lung disease, which proves that it possesses in large measure the combined powers of its two elements, would be a strong a priori argument in its favour as a powerful heart medicine, both Arsenic and Iodide having a very decided action on that organ. My own clinical experience proves that this is the case. It seems to act on the heart muscle,. arresting degeneration and restoring vitality. The coexistence of a chronic cough or chronic lung affection is the chief indication of preference over Arsenicum alb.

The salt in trituration is not very stable. I have used it almost exclusively in the third decimal trituration, but the alcoholic tincture of the same strength is a very active and reliable preparation.

AURUM.

“Great difficulty of breathing at night and on walking in the open air, requiring deep inspirations.” “Continuous aching in left side of chest.” “Beatings of the heart irregular, or by fits, sometimes with anguish and oppression of the chest.” “On any attempt to walk uphill, or on any little exercise, feels as if there were a crushing weight inside the sternum. He feels that if he did not stop walking the blood would burst through the chest.”

The mental sphere gives the great indication of Aurum : Melancholy and inquietude, with desire for death; despair; great anguish inducing a disposition to suicide. Other leading symptoms are : “Giddiness and fainting;” “Great sensitiveness to cold and yet a strong desire to go into the open air, even in bad weather, because it is found to be a relief;” “Aggravation of all symptoms at night from sunset to sunrise.”

Aurum is one of the chief antidotes to Mercury and is called for in cases of over-dosing with that drug; in syphilitic and mercuro-syphilitic cases; in fatty degeneration of the heart and arteries. In patients whose pulses are hard and unyielding from calcareous deposit there is often found the mental condition of Aurum and in such patients it will do excellent work.

BARYTA CARBONICA.

“Difficulty of breathing with sensation of fullness in the chest.” “Pains in the chest relieved partly by eructations and partly by external heat.” “Fullness and pressive heaviness on the chest, especially when ascending, with stitches, especially on inspiration.” “Very violent throbbings of the heart.” “Throbbing of the heart excited by lying on the left side, or renewed by thinking of it.”

Baryta carbonica has many symptoms of paralysis and degeneration of tissue : “Heaviness of the whole body;” “Necessity to lie down or be seated;” intellectual, nervous and physical weakness. It corresponds to scrofulous and glandular affections. It is a “chilly” medicine and is indicated by the consequences of chill. It is equally applicable to affections of the heart itself and of its vessels, having cured numbers of cases of aneurism.

BARYTA MURIATICA.

The symptoms of Baryta mur. are much like those of Baryta carb. and Baryta acetica and were originally published together in the same schemes. The salts of Muriatic acid have such strong affinity for the heart that it might be expected, a priori, that the cardiac action of the muriate would be more powerful than the carbonate. I cannot give any clearly differentiated symptoms to distinguish between the two. Allen gives under the muriate: “Beating of the heart irregular, pulse scarcely perceptible;” ” Pulse rapid, full;” “Pulse soft and irregular;” “Pain in the back.”

Hering mentions “palpitation,” “dyspnoea,” “oppression,” “trembling” and “paralytic weakness.” It is suited to scrofulous affections and persons subject to catarrh. In some conditions there is relief to breathing by sitting up with the head bent forward. It has cured a number of cases of aneurism.

The mineral water of Llangammarch in Breconshire, Central Wales, contains Baryta mur. in small quantities along with other chlorides, notably Natrum mur. An account of it will be found in the Homoeopathic World, Vol. XXVII (1892), p. 441. It has recently been advocated in the Lancet (November 24th, 1894, et seq.) as a remedy in heart disease and scrofula. Cases of anaemia with gastric catarrh had dilatation of the heart have received remarkable benefit from this water.

BELLADONNA.

A leading feature in the action of this drug is the intensity of the palpitation it causes. It extends from the heart to the minutest blood-vessels and hence arises the appropriateness of Belladonna for a great variety of inflammations in which throbbing pains are marked. “Violent beatings of the heart (which are sometimes felt in the head).” “Palpitation of the heart when ascending.” “Great inquietude and beatings in the chest.”

“Trembling of the heart with anguish and piercing pain.” “Shooting in the chest, sometimes as from knives and chiefly in coughing and yawning.” Respirations short, anxious and rapid. Pulse strong and quick, or full and slow, or small and quick, or hard and wiry. Belladonna conditions are often induced by chill, especially chill after hair-cutting. There is often redness and bloatedness of the face. It acts best in persons of lymphatic or plethoric constitution, especially persons with blue eyes, light hair, fine complexion and delicate skin.

There are very few heart conditions in which Belladonna may not be called for according to the general and local conditions of the drug.

BRYONIA.

For this polychrest to be indicated some of the leading characteristics among the general symptoms of the medicine must be present : Anxiety, inquietude, fear of the future. Discouragement. Irascibility and passion. Aggravation of all symptoms on movement, better when lying on painful side or painful part; frequent nose-bleed; lips dry, swollen and cracked; indigestion; thickly coated tongue; sense of weight or stone at chest, worse after meals; constipation; disagreeable, vexatious dreams; dreams of transactions of the day; starting with fright on going to sleep and during sleep. Some of these symptoms should be present as well as local conditions :-“Pressive pains in precordial region;” “Stitches; cramp; oppression; tearing stitches in left side of chest from behind forward, better from rest, worse from motion and deep inspirations.” “Palpitation; heart beats violently and rapidly.”

John Henry Clarke
John Henry Clarke MD (1853 – November 24, 1931 was a prominent English classical homeopath. Dr. Clarke was a busy practitioner. As a physician he not only had his own clinic in Piccadilly, London, but he also was a consultant at the London Homeopathic Hospital and researched into new remedies — nosodes. For many years, he was the editor of The Homeopathic World. He wrote many books, his best known were Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica and Repertory of Materia Medica