The Teaching of Therapeutics. Elsewhere in this number of THE HOMOEOPATHIC RECORDER, we publish with trifling omissions, a most illuminating article by Hobart Amory Hare, M.D., taken from the Journal of The American Medical Association for February, 7, 1920.
Anything which Prof. Have has to say, is entitled to the great respect his distinguished service to medicine must compel. It is, therefore, with much pleasure that we reproduce his observations upon the teaching of therapeutics in the O.S.
In our own, the teaching of therapeutics and of materia medica is given much greater prominence, but by no means the prominence which the importance of this great subject deserves. If the hours devoted to the description of impossible operations or to the laborious teaching of useless technical specialities were devoted to materia medica and therapeutics, the graduates of homoeopathic medical colleges would go out far better equipped for their lifes work than is at present the case.
Homoeopathy is losing ground for this very reason and large majority of the homoeopathic graduates are floundering in hopeless ignorance of the tools with whose use they ought to be familiar. It is really pathetic to see the unscientific, incongruous therapeutic medley of remedies, applied in the treatment of patients who are finally brought to the hospital, after surviving the onslaughts of these so – called doctors. Small wonder, then, that so little homoeopathy is practiced by present day graduates. These must be reform soon or as a school will be lost!
Rumex Crispus. This remedy is chiefly of use in affections of the respiratory organs, particularly in laryngo – tracheitis or in a bronchitis of the larger bronchi. Certain guiding symptoms stand our prominently and must be present if this medicine is to be given. A recent striking case will serve to illustrate its sphere of action very clearly. A brunette of nineteen years and a sufferer from hay fever, had been coughing for nine weeks without respite and in spite of treatment. She had been examined physically by competent physicians, but with negative findings, except for the ordinary signs of a bronchitis of the larger bronchial tubes.
A skiagram of the lungs proved negative also, as did a bacteriological examination of the very scanty sputum. Some surgical work had been done in the nose, to remove an enlarged middle turbinate; but the cough went blissfully on. The latter was dry, choking, spasmodic, often causing vomiting of the food previously eaten. Cough < when going into the cold open air, from inhaling the cold air of the bed – room at night, from laughing, talking, exertion, or from anything which increased or disturbed the respiratory rhythm. Cough > by keeping the mouth covered at night, by warmth in general and by quiet. Tickling in suprasternal fossa.
Pallor, some sense of weariness and loss of appetite were present. Temperature at the time of examination 99. Rumex crispus 200, in repeated doses for a few days, produced a decided improvement. The underlying constitutional state will, of course, require further treatment; in all likelihood Psorinum will prove to be the basic remedy.
Benzol in Leukaemia. The following extract from J.A.M.A. is of importance. Benzol should receive a careful homoeopathic proving, as no doubt it would prove to be a valuable addition to our materia medica. At present, from the standpoint of homoeopatherapy, we can say nothing about it. In the O.S. Bastedo and Wilcox do not mention it in their work on materia medica and pharmacology.
BENZOL IN LEUKAEMIA. Pignetto reports two cases of myelogenous leukaemia marked improvement followed Benzol treatment. The first patient was a woman of 45; the erythrocytes increased from 2,000,000 to 5,000,000 by the eighty – third day, the hemoglobin from 60 to 88 per cent., while the leukocytes dropped from 600,000 to 7,500. She took 2 gm. Benzol daily at first and increased to 5 gm. without any sings of intolerance except at first and toward the last, compelling brief suspension of the treatment. A total of 256 gm. was thus taken.
She kept well for three months after the close of the course of treatment, and then returned to her home in the country and further details are not known. The second patient was a woman of 55, and the leukaemia subsided somewhat under roentgen exposures three times a week for a month, the leukocytes dropping from 200,000 to 120,000. Then increasing weakness and other symptoms compelled abandonment of the exposure, and Benzol was given, a total of 150 gm, with improvement as in the other case. It has persisted during the two years to date, with nothing left of leukaemia except the anaemic complexion. This patient takes arsenic twenty days each month.
American Homeopathy Doctor.
Rabe graduated from the New York Homeopathic Medical College and trained under Timothy Field Allen and William Tod Helmuth.
Rabe was President of the International Hahnemannian Association, editor in chief of the Homeopathic Recorder, and he wrote Medical Therapeutics for daily reference. Rabe was Dean and Professor of Homeopathic Therapeutics at the New York Homeopathic Medical College.