Clinical Cases and Verifications (1902)



During that time I have treated ten cases by intubation, using it whenever I was a little at sea about my remedy. I have used antitoxine in five cases and it caused no complications. They were the only cases in which I have had to use the antitoxine, and no complications followed; but Bromine, Kali bi-chrom. and Hepar sulphur have been the remedies that have worked my cures. Ipecae, Lycopodium, Baptisia, the Mercurius and Kali bi chrom have cured scores of cases that were not croupous. When the croupous type has come on I have almost invariably found Spongia, Iodine and Hepar sulphur the indicated remedies, with one or two cases of Aconite. (Applause).

C. M. Boger, M.D.: I am glad the paper stirred up that discussion. I have used other remedies, of course, for membranous croup, including the yellow Iodide of Mercury, but my experience with membranous croup when Lachesis was indicated in that way has been very bitter. I have lost some cases that did not look very desperate, and lost them in a hurry, too. In my own house I once had seven cases of diphtheria and lost three in one month. I had the opinion of specialists and physicians in the whole country. On the third day they took on a black appearance. That was the commencement of death every time. I never met but one physician who has seen this appearance in diphtheria. A Pittsburgh physician, in an epidemic during the sixties in which it was marked, lost every case. I believe in the use of Lachesis, and changing the potencies every time a fresh aggravation comes on; but that symptom, as Dr. Kirkpatrick says, appears in almost every case—suffocation on going to sleep. A number of remedies have that symptom, but Lachesis is the main one. Rattle snake poison has it. Crocus has it.

H. C. Allen, M.D.: What potency do you give?

C. M. Boger, M.D.: The first dose is 200; and the peculiarity in that prescription is, that after three days there begins a rattle in the throat and vomiting; and then (Farrington mentions that in his materia medica) just as soon as that change comes I change the potency at once, and sometimes I have to make the fourth change.

H. C. Allen, M.D.: Have you ever tried giving it higher in the start? It is worth trying. I do not think you would have so many relapses.

M. Boger, M.D.: The after effects on the vocal cord is very great prostration. The expectoration is something terrific.

J. A. Kirkpatrick, M.D.: One thought comes to my mind, suggested by the physician on the right: These fatalities have not been so great since 1897. That corresponds with my own experience and observations. I have not lost a single case since then, and I have had a number of cases both of diphtheria and membranous croup. I believe that there are cycles through which diseased are aggravated, and there are fatal periods; there are times when we meet cases that it seems are stark fatal when they begin. I would like to know what the other experiences have been; since 1897, coming from all parts of the country, the fatalities have been less than they were previous to that time.

C. M. Boger, M:D: The doctor is right about the cycles.

C.M. Boger
Cyrus Maxwell Boger 5/ 13/ 1861 "“ 9/ 2/ 1935
Born in Western Pennsylvania, he graduated from the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and subsequently Hahnemann Medical College of Philadelphia. He moved to Parkersburg, W. Va., in 1888, practicing there, but also consulting worldwide. He gave lectures at the Pulte Medical College in Cincinnati and taught philosophy, materia medica, and repertory at the American Foundation for Homoeopathy Postgraduate School. Boger brought BÅ“nninghausen's Characteristics and Repertory into the English Language in 1905. His publications include :
Boenninghausen's Characteristics and Repertory
Boenninghausen's Antipsorics
Boger's Diphtheria, (The Homoeopathic Therapeutics of)
A Synoptic Key of the Materia Medica, 1915
General Analysis with Card Index, 1931
Samarskite-A Proving
The Times Which Characterize the Appearance and Aggravation of the Symptoms and their Remedies