PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM Medicine


PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM symptoms of the homeopathy remedy from Plain Talks on Materia Medica with Comparisons by W.I. Pierce. What PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM can be used for? Indications and personality of PHOSPHORICUM ACIDUM…


      PHOSPHORIC ACID-HPO3.

Introduction

      Phosphoric acid was first proved by Hahnemann, who recommended its use in the 9th dilution. It produces a condition of general weakness, a quiet, apathetic state, without excitement, and a keynote for its use is mental and physical exhaustion (155).

Symptoms

      It is of value in the exhaustion of the mental and nervous systems from sexual excesses (167) or from excessive fatigue, and in neurasthenia or nervous prostration (156) it is apt to be one of the first remedies that we think of. The patients are indifferent, too tired to think and any mental effort brings on a severe headache (93); they will give you short answers because it is too great an effort to try and collect their thoughts.

In low fevers this condition is very pronounced, a quiet and apathetic, almost stupid state from which they can be easily aroused, only to sink back into it again as soon as you leave them alone. It is of great value for prostration following typhoid fever, and for the effects of mental shock, grief or an unfortunate love affair, following well says Allen, after Ignatia. In homesickness (119), where the strains of “The girl I left behind me” have an especially depressing effect, it is of the first importance.

The headache of phosphoric acid is serve, compelling one to lie down; it is located especially on the vertex as a crushing pain or as a pressure downward from a weight (103).the hair turns gray early (88), the result of prolonged mental strain or excessive e grief, and is inclined to fall our.

In deafness with roaring in the ears (65), Phosphoric acid is to be thought of when down to anaemic conditions (15). The face is pale, spotted with acne (14), worse on forehead, nose and mouths; particularly in over-grown boys or girls with early sexual propensities, or in older persons suffering from or-sexual indulgence or abuse” (Dearborn) (167). A the mouth and lips are dry, especially in fevers, with thirst and desire for something juicy, and the gums are apt to become swollen and bleed easily (84).

In the stomach we have acid dyspepsia (178) with sour risings half an hour after eating 9177O, and the abdomen is usually distended and Tympanitic (13).

Phosphoric acid is a valuable and frequently called for remedy in acute and chronic diarrhoeas (58), the stools whitish, or yellow, and watery, the movements are preceded by rumbling in the abdomen (11) and are more or less gushing (59). the first portion, which is mixed with wind, seems to pass as water through a narrow opening m with some force, and is followed by small pieces of faecal matter. The movements are painless, in low fevers often involuntary, and are not exhausting. The call for stool requires reasonably prompt attention, but other than the necessity o keeping within a short walk of a closet, the patient suffers no inconvenience from a Phosphoric acids diarrhoea. there is aggravation after eating (57) an especially from fruit (57).

The urine may pass involuntarily in bed at night (198); it is a remedy having milky urine (199) with a white sediment consisting of phosphates and it is to be thought of in phosphaturia (200).

Phosphoric acid is frequently indicated in diabetes (56) not simply from the general symptoms of the disease, such as increased watery urine, great thirst and extreme weakness and emaciation, but especially, as Hughes points out, “in diabetes of nervous origin.” allen says” “Its collateral symptoms of diabetes Mellitus are pronounced and its curative power in that disease is undoubted.”

As an illustration of the views held by the old school, let me quote from Ringer, who says” “Phosphoric acid has been recommended in diabetes., Griesinger, who has carefully studied the action of this medicine considers that it does more harm than good. He pushed the acid to the extent of an ounce daily, and found that this dose increased the sugar.” when you consider that the dilute phos. ac. of the U. S. Pharmacopoeia is ten times as strong as our tincture or last centesimal dilution, you will get an idea to what extent the drug was “pushed.” We might look upon this as an additional proving of Phosphoric acid and as th same time offer up a prayer of thankfulness that there is a method or practice other than that taught by the old school.

Phosphoric acid is of great value for the recent or remote effects of excessive seminal emission, s whether licensed or otherwise. Among the general results are vertigo, brain-fag (93), impotence (167), spinal anaemia, weakness in the small of the back and heaviness of the lower extremities, It is of value says hering for :onanism when the patient is distressed by the culpability when asleep, when straining at stool or after urinating, and for orchitis (188) with great sensitiveness of the parts to touch; all of these conditions being associate with the mental and physical exhaustions so characteristic of the remedy.

The women needing Phosphoric acid is anaemic (15) or chlorotic (17), with complete indifference to everything, and suffering, perhaps, from prolapsus of the uterus (203), the result of her general weakness. Menstruation is usually too early and too profuse (135), accompanied by profuse urination and followed by exhaustion (138)and profuse leucorrhoea (126)./ It is to be thought of in tympanitic distention of the uterus (205), it feels “as full of wind”(Hering).

The cough of Phosphoric acid is usually loose and seems to come from the stomach (44)’ it may b34 spasmodic and cue to tickling, as from a feather (43), from the larynx to the middle of the chest, or from irritation as from dust, which extends the whole length of the trachea. The cough is worse morning and evening and after sleep, as well as from cold air (40). It is to be thought of in broncho-pneumonia (51), with profuse secretion, or expectoration of mucus in small balls (69).

In the heart it is often of use in a form of nervous palpitation (111) resulting from self abuse or sexual excess (111).

Phosphoric acid is to be thought of in growing pains in children (84), and it is of value in caries of the lumbar vertebrae (207) and in hip joint disease (1217).A characteristic sensation, especially in scrofulous disease, is as if a bone were going scraped wit a knife, and being of the pain at night.

It is a remedy of very frequent use in typhoid fever and may be indicated throughout the disease where the feeling of exhaustion is your leading symptom. In severe cases we have, in addition to the weakness and prostration, inability to protrude the tongue or to articulate distinctly and a tendency to slide down in bed (21). We may have light stupor or quiet delirium, dry lips and tongue, with a red streak down the center of t latter (192), nosebleed, tympanitis, involuntary type of typhoid (193).

I use phosphoric acid in the tincture.

Willard Ide Pierce
Willard Ide Pierce, author of Plain Talks on Materia Medica (1911) and Repertory of Cough, Better and Worse (1907). Dr. Willard Ide Pierce was a Director and Professor of Clinical Medicine at Kent's post-graduate school in Philadelphia.