Natural order. Liliaceae. Common name. Onion. Habitat. A plant universally cultivated as a garden vegetable. Preparation. Tincture from the fresh common red onion.
GENERAL ANALYSIS.
Acts especially upon the conjunctiva and the respiratory mucous membrane, producing a highly irritated condition, greatly resembling an acute catarrh. It also produces, in a less degree, catarrhal conditions of the intestinal tract.
CHARACTERISTIC SYMPTOMS.
Mind. Indefinable anxiety.
Head. Confusion of the head. Headache, with coryza; in the room, evenings; better in open air; aggravated on returning to a warm room (Pulsatilla). Pains in temples, most in right, aggravated by winking; extending over forehead; worse on left side.
Eyes. Excessive, non-excoriating (excoriating, Euphr.) lachrymation; left eye worse, with redness of the eyeball; sensitive to light (Aconite, Belladonna); worse evenings. Itching, biting, burning in the eyes. Pain as if the eyes hung loose posteriorly on a string.
Nose. Copious watery discharge from the nose, and watering of the eyes (Aconite, Euphr.). Constant sneezing with profuse acrid (bland, Euphr.) coryza (Ail. gland., Aurum, Mercurius, Sanguinaria, Squilla.); when coming into a warm room (in cool air, Arsenicum). Fluent coryza, headache, lachrymation cough, heat, thirst, trembling of the hands; worse in evening and in a room; better in open air (Pulsatilla).
Throat. Pain in throat extending to the ear (Agaricus, Belladonna, Hepar s., Kali bichromicum), Constrictive pain in fore part of throat. IN region of os hyoides, then low down posteriorly on right side. Thirst, evenings with heat.
Abdomen. Rumbling in bowels. Very offensive flatus. Sudden burning or chilling cutting, as thin as a threat from sides of hypogastrium inward and upward.
Urinary Organs. Frequent and copious urination (Apis, Argentum met., Argentum, nit., Phosphorus ac.). Urine red, with much urging and burning in the urethra (Aconite, Cantharis).
Respiratory Organs. Catarrhal hoarseness (Arum, Causticum, Carb. v., Phosphorus). Tickling in throat, with aching in larynx. Hacking cough from inhaling cold air (Aconite, Bromium). Throbbing and contracted sensation in larynx (Bromium). Constant inclination to hack. Violent catarrhal laryngitis; the hoarse cough seemed to split and tear the larynx. Oppressed breathing from pressure in middle of chest.
Limbs. Sore, tired feeling of the limbs, especially arms. Pain in external soft parts of right great toe, and in left middle finger.
Generalities. Flitting heat over the whole body, and thirst. Weak and tired, has to lie down. Coldness alternates with heat during catarrh. Aching throughout the body. Neuralgic pains, like a long thread, in face, head, neck, and elsewhere; worse evenings.
Aggravation. Prominently in the evening and in a warm room. Better in the open air.
Compare. Aconite, Arsenicum, Arum., Bromium, Euphr., Ipecac., Pulsatilla, Squilla.
THERAPEUTICS
Allium cepa is most useful in acute coryza, having the characteristic of excessively profuse secretion, that from the eyes being bland and non-excoriating, while that from the nose is very acid and excoriating (Reverse, Euphr.). Associated with this condition we usually find the characteristic catarrhal symptoms of the larynx as noted above, and a severe frontal headache. These symptoms have also led to the successful use of the drug in the first stage of measles. It has also been used for neuralgia accompanying the characteristic catarrh, and also when following the injuries of nerves after surgical operations (Hypericum), the pains being fine, thread-like, and shooting in their character.
ALLEN CORSON COWPERTHWAITE was born at Cape May, New Jersey, May 3, 1848, son of Joseph C. and Deborah (Godfrey) Cowperthwaite. He attended medical lectures at the University of Iowa in 1867-1868, and was graduated from the Hahnemann Medical College of Philadelphia in 1869. He practiced his profession first in Illinois, and then in Nebraska. In 1877 he became Dean and Professor of Materia Medica in the recently organized Homeopathic Department of the State University of Iowa, holding the position till 1892. In 1884 he accepted the chair of Materia Medica, Pharmacology, and Clinical Medicine in the Homeopathic Medical College of the University of Michigan. He removed to Chicago in 1892, and became Professor of Materia Medica and Therapeutics in the Chicago Homeopathic Medical College. From 1901 he also served as president of that College. He is the author of various works, notably "Insanity in its Medico-Legal Relations" (1876), "A Textbook of Materia Medica and Therapeutics" (1880), of "Gynecology" (1888), and of "The Practice of Medicine " (1901).