RHEUMATISM


One remembers a case in a young woman where Bryonia and Rhus tox. were tried with very little benefit; then it was noticed that the patient was rather tearful, that she had to move, kept on moving to get any ease; here Puls. was prescribed, and within less than twenty-four hours this young woman was out of her bed and anxious to return to her job.


RHEUMATISM is incurable, exclaimed a learned Judge the other day. One wonders what bitter experiences lay behind this sweeping statement of the legal authority. Was he so far wrong, after all?.

Shall we examine this conclusion in the light of modern medicine? Rheumatism is a common complaint and is caused by exposure to the elements, rain, wet overhead and underfoot, wind and cold. Men and women following outdoor occupations are frequent sufferers of rheumatism in its various manifestations. Policemen on point duty, lorry drivers, agricultural labourers, workmen in the building trade, charwomen, are all equally liable. Age makes very little difference, sex is no bar.

The insurance societies state that annually many thousand work-hours are lost, many thousands of workmen are crippled and laid aside for weeks, and much money is paid out in sick pay, and industry loses time and money from this painful, though not necessarily fatal, disease. What has the medical profession done about it?.

Latterly, much money has been spent in research, whatever that may mean; rheumatism clinics have been opened in various parts of the country; various spas have improved the facilities they provide for treatment. Expensive electrical apparatus has been installed in these clinics, thousands of pounds have been invested in the latest ultra-violet ray lamps; most of them will be out-of-date and old=violent ray lamps; most of them will be out-of-date and old-fashioned in a year or two.

Mercury vapour lamps and radiant heart lamps were all the rage some time ago; now it must be infra-red lamps, which are said to charm away all pain. Even this in some quarters is ultra vires; some other lamps with even shorter rays act more magically-that is, in the imagination of the electrical manufacturers. There is a section of the medical profession who frankly say they know nothing about these lamps and rather doubt their efficacy; they would pin their faith in foam baths. Some of the insurance companies are sending their crippled pensioners to the British spas, such as Bath and other places.

There is a multitude of advice. “You pays your money, and you takes your choice.” These is, of course, still the old conservative type of doctor who sears by heroic doses of salicylic acid and aspirin; others prefer the latest product of the large French or British drug houses, which has to be inoculated or injected into the poor unfortunate victim with sometimes dire results.

One remembers one lady who, after an injection of a highly vaunted product of a German firm which was given for rheumatism of the neck, found herself unexpectedly in the casualty ward of a General Hospital, and was then told she had suddenly fainted in public vehicle and, as nobody could bring her round, she had been taken to the hospital and had lain there for hours Proper knock-our drops, werent they?

And after this ignominious exhibition of herself, was she any better? No, she felt much more ill than she had one before, and had to stay in bed for days and was so shaken by her unpleasant experience that she could not travel in buses or trams without being seized with violent tremors.

As ordinarily she was a very strong-minded and active, person she did not like this state of affairs at all; she had bottles of strong tonic from the doctor which made no difference at all to her state nor to the original rheumatism. And do you know what set her right in a day or two, that she could ride in public vehicles, that she could move her neck without excruciating pain? Just a few doses of Lachesis: the homoeopathic preparation of the South American rattlesnake.

It was given to her as her headaches were LAchesis headaches, she had the LAchesis heats, her pains were left-sided, and so on; her whole condition cried out for Lachesis; and, when she got it, everything cleared up, even the swelling of the neck muscles disappeared.

What about it, My Lord: is rheumatism curable? This lady, at any rate, can testify to it that hers went quickly, and without leaving any aftermath. Can Homoeopathy produce any other witnesses? This positive case may only have been a fluke, a happy coincidence, and, being a member of a very exact and meticulous profession, he will require more evidence before he will change his sentence.

But we homoeopaths can produce many positive proofs of cures of rheumatism; our literature is full of such cures and, if living witness are wanted, they can be produced at will.

One recalls the case of a sturdy six foot detective inspector, who had the classical signs of acute rheumatic fever; swollen joints, acute pains, sour sweats, high temperatures; he was booked for at least six weeks in bed, if not more. His temperature came down in three days, his sweats ceased in less than a week, and he was up and about in little over three weeks, minus a weak heart, and as strong and hefty as before, and he never had even a grain of salicylic acid or a single pill or aspirin! Nor was he rubbed with liniment.

He was given metallic Mercury in minute doses; in old-school medicine MErcury is reserved for syphilitic cases, but there was no syphilis in this inspectors past history, at least to a follower of Hahnemann, and, strangely enough, Mercury cured rapidly and so quickly that the police surgeon who had to pay weekly visits in order to make official reports to the authorities was astonished himself.

The symptoms pointing to Mercury were as follows: very offensive sweats, the more the patient sweated the worse he felt, he was so exhausted and so weary, he was only comfortable in bed, and yet as soon as he got warm in bed he had to throw off his bedclothes, then he felt cold and his pains got worse again and he covered himself again, and so it went on the whole time.

He hated the nights; all his pains, all his discomfort was worse during the night. His tongue was thickly furred; he presented the picture of a man who had taken an overdose of Mercury, a common enough sight in the venereal wards in the old days. And as I said before, Mercury in small doses acted rapidly and cured him.

Acute rheumatic fever takes anything from six to fourteen weeks or more to recover from as a rule; past experience in the wards of the large teaching hospitals experience in the this is so. And there seems to be very little change in the results obtained nowadays with the latest treatment. Patients still report a stay of many weeks in hospital, if rheumatic fever is diagnosed; and to find later that homoeopathic treatment shortens the course of a wearisome and expensive disease, such as rheumatic fever, is most gratifying.

I may be allowed at this point to stress the importance of the financial costs of a lengthy illness; it affects industry, as it may be a valuable worker who is laid low; it affects the insurance societies who have to pay out more money; and it affects the individual worker and his family, as, when a man is losing his income, the family has to live on the savings, if any, or miserably subsist on the small sick-pay. And it also affects the ratepayers pocket, as a bed is being occupied for weeks by one person at a considerable cost.

If the time of stay could be reduced, there would be an all-round gain. If the medical profession and the hospitals would only realize what has been done for acute diseases under homoeopathic treatment, the lot of the individual patient would be much happier. I shall be told that I have not proved my case by just quoting one patients history. I shall therefore mention another case; she was a middle-aged woman, the mother of a large family.

She had rheumatic fever, but the minute details of her illness were very different from the case I mentioned previously: there was practically no perspiration, she was not very restless as movement definitely made the pains worse, warmth relieved the acute pains, the warm bed, the warm flannel dressing relieved, the pains were wandering, shifting ones, that is one day one joint was affected, the next day a totally different joint was more swollen and inflamed, one day she had diarrhoea and that day her pains hardly troubled her.

I did not spot the remedy straight away, but after a few days it became clear to me that Kali. bichrom. was the correct medicine, and after that we had very little trouble; I remember the nurse was horrified because I would not allow any oil of winter green to be used or any friction with turpentine liniment. In the end she expressed her surprise that the case had turned out to be such a mild one, it had got well so quickly. I cannot recall the length of time this lady was ill; the temperature came down in less than a week and she was, I fancy, up and about in under the six weeks.

These two were both severe cases in the beginning, and had taken a good hold of the respective people before they came under medical care, and were on that account all the greater credit to homoeopathic treatment.

Now we shall leave the subject of acute rheumatic fever and tackle the more common and more widely spread muscular rheumatism.

Dorothy Shepherd
Dorothy Shepherd 1885 – 1952 - British orthodox physician who converted to homeopathy. Graduated from Hering College in Chicago. She was a pupil of J.T.Kent. Author of Magic of the Minimum Dose, More Magic of the Minimum Dose, A Physician's Posy, Homeopathy in Epidemic Diseases.