Squilla is as much an irritant to the kidneys and bladder as it is to the respiratory passages. It is doubtless capable of causing acute nephritis and all the phenomena of Bright’s disease, hence it will be Homoeopathic to cardiac disease, secondary to renal disease.
The urinary symptoms in the provings are striking, but owing to no analysis having been made we do not know the actual amount of disease cured.
STERCULIA ACUMINATA.
(Kola nut.)
Botany. – Kola is a species of the genus Sterculia of the sterculiaceae; botanical name, Sterculia Acuminata. It grows in Africa, between Sierra Leone and Congo. It is a small tree, resembling somewhat the chestnut tree, and may attain from ten to twenty feet in height.
The fruit of the Kola (the nut) contains from ten to fifteen seeds, chestnut form, and of variable dimensions; these are red or white; the coloring matter is exclusively in the epidermis. The seeds easily separate into the two halves, of rosy or white color. The substance is composed of cells, stuffed with large starch grains, resembling a potato on section. It is in these cells that are found the Caffeine and Theo-bromine.
The Kola tree bears its nuts when about ten years old. At this epoch a good-sized tree may produce twice a year eighty or ninety pounds of nuts. These are made much use of by the natives, who attribute to them diverse medical properties. They are, for instance, properly used for their stimulant, sialagogue and stomachic effect. The Africans chew them much as the Brazilians do coca, and they ascribe to them quite as marvelous properties. In certain districts of Africa, visited by that daring traveler, Rene Caillie, he found Kola nuts so much prized by the natives as to be used for money. The white Kolas were regarded as valuable presents, i.e., between a host and his guest. To send a person red Kolas, however, was regarded as an insult. Solemn oats were, in fat, made on the Kola, which was treated as a sort of fetich. its active principle is Caffeine. It also contains Theobromine and Tannin. The powdered nut contains two parts Caffeine.
“PHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECTS.
“It is used as coffee is, in infusion, by the natives of Africa. Among the physiological properties which we think may properly be ascribed to the infusion are the following:
“1. It produces insomnia.
“2. It is an aphrodisiac (Heckel & Schlogdenhauffen).
“3. Like coffee, it is an excitant of the intellect and of the imagination.
“4. It restrains tissue waste, being essentially an aliment d’ epargne.
“We do not know by what mechanism Kola diminishes the combustion of the animal economy, without diminishing the vigor of the organism, but the fact is none the less patent. According to Keiss and Duval, principles of the order of Caffeine favor the transformation of heat into force, and enable the organism to use to better advantage the true alimentary substances previously ingested. We do not know whether this be the true explanation, or whether, according to Mongazza, they act simply by hyperexcitation of the nervous functions – whence the name which he applies to them – nervous ailments. It is certain that, although containing a small per cent. of nitrogen, they are not utilized as food, but traverse the organism without undergoing decomposition.
“It appears from careful observations of Dr. Monnet, of Paris, that Kola is diuretic. This might have been anticipated, from the fact that Caffeine is diuretic. Moreover, there are the same energizing of the heart’s action and increase of vascular tension which attend the use of Caffeine. Yet, while the effects of these are so near alike, Dr. Monnet is inclined to think that Kola is the more energetic of the two, and that its effects in raising the blood-pressure and regulating the cardiac pulsations are decidedly more pronounced than those of Caffeine. In a little book published by Dr. Monnet last year are recorded numerous physiological experiments made by him to determine the action of Kola on the vascular system. He there showed by sphygmographic tracings that in both cold-blooded and warm-blooded animals subcutaneous injections of a certain number of cubic centimetres of an infusion of twenty grammes of Kola in twenty grammes of water raise the vascular tension – with, however, this difference, that in frogs this increase of temperature is accompanied by slowing of the heart’s action, while in warm- blooded animals (dogs) there is an augmented rapidity of the pulsations. But augmentation of tension and acceleration of the heart’s beat seem to be antagonistic phenomena, as the law of Marey affirms. This eminent physiologist has laid down the principle that the faster the heart beats the less resistance it meets in emptying itself; in other words, the heart slows its action when there is any augmentation of tension. In the frog this law finds verification; in dogs it has, in my experience, yet to be verified. This law, to do justice the principles which it enumerates, is a law made in virtue of immutable physical principles, but which takes no account of the nervous system and its influence, which are almost nil in the frog, but much more considerable in the dog, and greater still in man. These conditions, then, of excitability of the heart of the warm- blooded animals do not allow us rigorously to accept Marey’s law, and the contradictions of my experience are more apparent than real.”
In addition to these valuable physiological experiments we need a series of provings to elicit guiding symptoms. Unless we have these we cannot select it with accuracy, or differentiate it from Digitalis, Convallaria, Adonis or Caffeine. Kola has not been used extensively as a medicine, but the Allopathic school of France – namely, Drs. Cunio, Durian, Dujardin Beaumetz and Monnet – have used it empirically with good results.
Dr. Monnet, in summing up the properties of Kola, arrives at the following conclusions:
“1. Kola, by the Caffeine and Theobromine which it contains, is a tonic of the heart, whose pulsations it accelerates, while it increases their power and regulates their contractions.
“2. In the second phase of its action it becomes, like Digitalis, a regulator to the pulse, whose energy it raises; under its influence the pulsations become more ample and less numerous.
“3. As a result of its effect on the vascular tension, diuresis augments, and this fact renders it valuable in affections of the heart with dropsy.
“4. It seems to result from my observations that Kola, while energizing the cardiac contractions and promoting the contractility of the muscles of organic life, has, nevertheless, a paralyzing influence on the striped muscles when employed in toxic doses.
“5. It is a waste restrainer, diminishing the losses of the economy from the combustion of the agatized compounds – probably from a special action on the nervous system.
“6. It is a powerful tonic by the principles which it contains, and its employment is indicated by anaemias, in chronic affections of debilitating character, and in convalescence from grave fevers.
“7. It favors digestion, probably by augmenting the secretion of gastric juice (apeptic influence), and by acting on the unstriped muscles of the stomach, which it tonifies. Under its influence anorexia disappears, and the digestive functions become more regular.
“8. Lastly, it is an antidiarrhoeic medicament of great value, and as such as rendered good service in chronic diarrhoea, and in certain cases of sporadic cholera, although its action in these instances may not as yet be clearly explained.”
This last-mentioned property is possessed in a large degree by another drug which is used by the natives of South America in a manner similar to Coffee and Kola, namely, Guarana. Our school has found Guarana useful in diarrhoea due to deficient digestion and faulty assimilation. I expect it will be of great value in two classes of cases, namely: 1. Patients with organic or functional diseases of the heart – with feeble circulation – anaemia from loss of appetite – with faulty digestion and assimilation, with a tendency to dropsy. 2. In children -feeble from improper food – with loose, undigested stools – nervous erethism – and poor circulation and defective elimination of morbid secretions.
Dr. Monnet records two cases of “Cephalalgia, due to circulatory disturbances,” cured promptly by Kola. He doubtless means those varieties of megrim now called “spastic,” when the intense pain coincides with cold, pale face and cold extremities. I believe it will prove as useful as Guarana in nervous sick-headache, just the opposite of those we cure with Sanguinarin, which has hot face, throbbing arteries, etc.
It appears to me that Kola has some resemblance to coca, for it is used as a remedy against fatigue, and to enable the natives to endure great physical exertion. In wasting diseases and the convalescence offices it ought to prove a valuable aid to other restorative remedies.
Dose – French physicians use one teaspoonful of the tincture, frequently repeated, in severe cases. The tincture is made by adding one oz. of pulverized Kola nuts, five ozs. of alcohol (at 60 degrees), macerate fourteen days, and filter. Doubtless the lower dilutions and triturations will be potent enough except in grave cases of heart-failure.
Hale wrote Lectures On Diseases Of The Heart, Materia medica and special therapeutics of the new remedies Volume 1, Materia Medica And Special Therapeutics Of The New Remedies Volume 2, Saw Palmetto: (Sabal Serrulata. Serenoa Serrulata), The Medical, Surgical, and Hygienic Treatment of Diseases of Women, New Remedies: Their Pathogenetic Effects and Therapeutic Application, Ilex Cassine : the aboriginal North American tea, Repertory to the New Remedies with Charles Porter Hart, The Characteristics of the New Remedies, Materia Medica and Special Therapeutics of the New Remedies, The Practice of Medicine, Homoeopathic Materia Medica of the New Remedies: Their Botanical Description etc.