In affections of the bowels our personal experience with Gelseminum is very limited. Eclectics profess to have employed it with great success in bilious diarrhoea, dysentery and in spasmodic colic, causes by the presence of worms. There is certainly no reason why it should not moderate the tormina and tenesmus in dysentery, or relax the spasm in strangulated hernia, or the spasmodic distress caused by worms. Dr. Hale says, that “he has had unusual success in treating worm affections with Gelsemin 2, decimal trituration, alternated with Podophyllin, 1st or 2d, and Santonin, one tenth, each in grain doses, two hours apart. After two or three days the worms are either expelled in large numbers, or the verminous symptoms all disappear. A weak dilution of the tincture injected into the rectum will often bring away large quantities of ascarides.”
We have already alluded to the fact, that Gelseminum has evinced fine therapeutic powers in dysmenorrhoea. Dr. Allen, of New- York, relieved a case of dysmenorrhoea of long standing by a small dose of Gelseminum 100. This seems a most extraordinary case, where dysmenorrhoea, chronic sore throat and deafness were cured at one blow. Nevertheless, all these ailments may have resulted from one and the same condition of abnormal innervation, and, for this reason, yielded to a remedial influence that was adequate to remove the first cause of these derangements.
Spasmodic labor-pains and distressing and exhausting after pains, are controlled by Gelseminum. In uterine haemorrhage, from atony of the uterine vessels, Gelseminum has been employed with success. In prolonged menorrhagia it may be depended upon as an efficient agent to arrest the flow of blood. The homoeopathicity of this drug will have to be determined by the accompanying symptoms and the general nature of the case.
In general, Gelseminum is one of those agents which will prove of vast benefit to an accoucheur. It has power to speedily overcome the rigidity of the os uteri, which is so often an obstacle to labor, and will quiet the nervousness which is so troublesome to parturient females, or during pregnancy, and will afford them a refreshing sleep, if they should be tormented by sleeplessness.
Our provings point to Gelseminum as an a gent that may do good service in catarrh and influenza. The headache and the peculiar irritation which this agent occasions, the sharp, shooting pains in the forehead, the catarrhal irritation of the Schneiderian membrane, fluid discharges from the nose and throat, soreness and irritation of the air-passages, cough, and the general debility, chilliness and the more or less general myalgia which we find recorded among the pathogenetic symptoms of this drug, justify its use in simple catarrhal affections. Of course, it will not supercede Aconite, Arsenic, Tartar-emetic and other drugs belonging to the same series.
In spasmodic and racking cough, having a catarrhal origin, with irritation of the lining membrane of the air-passages, we have derived benefit from the use of this drug. We have never depended upon it either in acute bronchitis or acute pneumonia, although in pulmonary congestion, its employment would seem justified upon homoeopathic principles. Some of the pathogenetic symptoms of this drug point to acute congestion of pulmonary parenchyma. One of Dr. Henry’s symptoms reads: “Short, paroxysmal pain in the superior part of the right lung; on taking a long breath, it sticks from above downwards; this pain in the lungs is one of the most prominent symptoms.”
In spasm of the glottis, Gelseminum has been used with some benefit by some homoeopathic physicians. We have cured the most threatening cases of this disease with Aconite, but should not hesitate to employ both drugs in alternation, giving a much larger dose of the Gelseminum than the Aconite.
In fever Gelseminum commends itself to the attention of homoeopathic practitioners. In the common catarrhal, or even rheumatic fever, we have always got along very satisfactorily with Aconite, Chamomilla, Mercurius-vivus, using in the more deep-seated cases a few doses of Belladonna,. Gelsemium has proved a most acceptable addition to th is group of remedies, especially when the fever-type approximated to the remittent type. In the infantile remittent fever, which Schoenlein describes as acute scrofula, Gelseminum is a very efficient curative agent. It must not be expected, however, that such a fever can be cured as if by magic. In infantile remittents the fever depends upon an acute irritation of the mesenteric ganglia, on which account, Schoenlein likewise denominates such a pathological condition “acute ganglionitis,” If there is much stupor, dry heat of the skin, especially of the abdomen, flushed face, dilatation of the pupils, Belladonna may be required. Iodine and Aconite are useful agents in this disease. Let us likewise be thankful for the powerful aid of Gelseminum. We would suggest, however, that in some of the fine cures reported as cures of infantile remittent fever, the fever really was an acute attack of irritative fever of the remittent type, but where no ganglionic congestion stood in the way of a comparatively rapid cure.
In cerebro-spinal meningitis we commend Gelseminum as a reliably useful curative agent. In the third volume of the Proceedings of the N.Y. State Homoeopathic Medical Society, Dr. S. Searle, of Troy, N.Y., has set forth the homoeopathicity of Gelseminum to this disease in such a strikingly convincing manner, that we take the liberty of quoting some of his remarks: “Gelseminum has direct relation to the incipient or congestive stage of cerebro- spinal meningitis, and also in some degree to the consequent inflammation: while Cimicifuga-racemosa is, in my judgment, homoeopathic to the inflammation of the sero-fibrous tissues involved, and to the irritation of the cerebro-spinal system, which is due to the proximity of the inflammation of its investing membrane, and which manifests itself in spasms. It seems also correlative to that state of the blood which results in the petechiae so common in the severe cases of the disease, and, to use the post hoc ergo propter hoc argument as cumulative and confirmatory; I may say that I have used remedies, relying upon their homoeopathicity, with complete and uniform success.
“Let us now briefly compare the toxicology of these drugs, with the symptoms of the disease under discussion. An attack of cerebro-spinal meningitis is usually sudden, and is ushered in by a severe chill, accompanied by evident congestion of the spine and brain, with its ordinary symptoms, among which, I believe, dilatation of the pupils is always seen. This state is followed, except in those cases which die collapsed, by reactionary fever of corresponding violence. In such a condition of the system no remedy is so homoeopathic as Gelseminum. In cases of poisoning by Gelseminum, the universal symptoms are prostration; complete loss of muscular power, of vision and speech; staggering gait; icy coldness of the hands and feet; pulse very feeble or imperceptible; respiration labored, feeble; nausea and vomiting. All of these symptoms are relieved by cerebral stimulants, showing what portion of the organism feels the depressing power of the drug. One symptom which is prominent and constant, that it is almost characteristic of Gelseminum, is languor and heaviness of the eyelids; they close in spite of all the efforts of the will. No language could more accurately described the incipient stage of the malady under consideration. In short, every symptom of intense congestion to the brain and spine, and the partial paralysis which necessarily attends it, may be found described with equal accuracy in the pathogenesis of this drug, and the diagnosis of the disease.
“It is stated by Hale ‘that the intense hyperaemia of the brain caused by Gelseminum stops just short of inflammation.’ As we have no record of post-mortem examinations in any case of reported death, there are no means of affirming or disproving this assumption; but I feel confident he is in error, and that the same law obtains in toxicology as in disease, viz: that long- continued congestion, especially if violent, must end in inflammation. The only conceivable exception is in cases where the congestion to vital organs is so overwhelming as at once to suspend their functions, and thus destroy life. Thus believing, I have continued the use of Gelseminum when its characteristic symptoms were manifest, even in the inflammatory stage of the disease. The indications which should determine its use, after inflammation has become decided, may be found in the pathogenesis of the drug, and are quite as distinctively characteristic of the disease when fully developed, as in its inception.”
We consider it as one of the remedies to be employed in bilious remittent fever, with frontal or general headache, dizziness, tendency to stupor, jaundiced color of the eyes and face, foul taste in the mouth, nausea and vomiting, bilious discharge from the bowels or constipation, prostration, pains in the muscles and bones,.
