If our materia medica cannot be of such a nature as to conform to the facts of these sciences; if our ideas of drug action and their application cannot be supported, confirmed and demonstrated by these branches of the curriculum, then it is time to discard this materia medica and these ideas and to substitute others for them. Fortunately, however, such is not necessary or the case. To my mind the greatest proof of our principle is the truth that it is in perfect harmony and accord with other barnacles of knowledge, and when the attempt is made to bind the whole into a concrete unity, discordant notes are not heard or fallacy revealed.
The writer would offer a forecast. When the time comes as come it must, when perfection of all things is obtained, there will be, in each of our lecture rooms and laboratories, some one gifted and well versed in our art to correlate and unite our facts concerning the action of drugs with the various other sciences. Such a one will, in the dissecting room, in addition to demonstrating the origin, insertion, nerve and blood supply of the right deltoid muscle, also inform the freshman student that Sanguinaria affects that muscle, that Secale modifies its blood supply and that Colocynthis attacks its supplying nerve.
In the clinical laboratory the student will receive just as thorough instruction in the detection of albumin as does his allopathic associate, but he will be taught in addition that Mercurius corrosivus will cause the appearance of albumin in the urine, and that Causticum has an influence upon the excretion of urates. The instructor will also in this lecture on bacteriology point out that, as different bacteria elect certain tissues upon which they act, in a similar manner drugs do the same thing; and so on through the course.
“hooking up” homoeopathic science with other fields of knowledge. What is the use of teaching the microscopical pathology of enteritis unless it bears some relationship to and should be considered in the prescription? At present, all this is left for the teacher of materia medica to accomplish but, try as he may, the result will not be nearly so satisfactory as it would be, could he have the co – operation of other teachers.
We have in homoeopathy what might be called a “homoeopathic technician.” By this term I mean one who has made a special study of drug action, particularly from our standpoint, and who is gifted with the ability to prescribe scientifically for the sick. He knows drugs, their toxic action, their physiological action, their symptomatology, modalities concordant relationships, etc. Such a one has a right to the designation “specialist” or “Homoeopathic technician.”
He who would demonstrate the relationships of the different sciences to the student need not be a “technician,” that we will leave for the materia medicist. It is said by the average student that materia medica is “hard to learn.” When there shall come into effect such a system of demonstration as proposed, such will not be the case and, not until the aim is accomplished, will homoeopathy be a reality to the average student, who, at the present time, leaves his materia medica in the class room and does not associate its truths with the ordinary affairs and phenomena of life.
Let us illustrate how pathology and symptomatology should be regarded in connection with the prescription. Suppose that two persons are suffering with the symptom, “burning pains in the stomach.” For the sake of brevity, we will let this represent the totality of the symptoms. The diagnosis in one case, i.e., the pathology is hyperchlorhydria, and in the other it is a mild form of gastritis. Both conditions give the same symptoms, a fact well known to the diagnostician. The remedy homoeopathic to the former case would be that one which has in its symptomatology “burning pains” and also the ability to cause excessive acid formation.
Such a remedy is CAlcarea phos. The remedy that is homoeopathic to the latter state is one that also has “burning pains” and beside is capable of producing the changes of inflammation. This remedy we will say is Arsenicum. Both these therapeutic agents are symptomatically indicated, yet neither of them has the same cause or pathology for its symptoms of indications as the other. Calcarea phos. will not help the latter case not will Arsenicum be effective in the former. Hundreds of examples of this kind are constantly occurring. We meet them constantly in everyday practice, and failure to prescribe the remedy that agrees both symptomatically and pathologically in a particular case is the most frequent cause of failure to cure the sick.
Another example is the use of Ipecac in the treatment of asthma. Ipecac is homoeopathic to the mere symptoms of many cases; it is quite closely related to the associated bronchitis, but is bears absolutely no relationship, similar or otherwise, to the underlying cause (pathology), which is a bronchial constriction; hence it is not curative in spasmodic asthma. Remedies prescribed for diseases when there is present only one of the important elements of the prescription, namely, a symptomatic similarity or a pathological similarity, cannot cure and all that can be expected of them is to relieve temporarily or to palliate.
We have been guilty of teaching many therapeutic fallacies because the remedies recommended for various diseases did not cover the complete requirements for a prescription. Examples of this are: the use of Gelsemium in labor when the os is hard, unyielding and does not dilate; the use of Uranium nitrate in diabetes; Belladonna in locomotor ataxia; Argentum nit. for Addisons disease: the use of Hepar sulphur in angioneurotic oedema, and Phosphorus in haemophilia. None of these remedies, and many more that can be mentioned, will cure the conditions for which they are recommended because, while symptomatically similar, they are not pathologically so as well.
Suppose we are to prescribe for the following groups of symptoms which are present in each of two persons, the totality being represented by contracted pupil, difficulty in walking and diarrhoea. All of these symptoms are found under the pathogenesis of Physostigmin and Secale. Upon examination, it is discovered that in one case the contracted pupil is due to the fact that the toxin of disease is stimulating the nerve supplying the iris, and in the other case the myotic effect is due to the toxins affecting the iris directly.
Physostigmin is the indicated remedy in the first instance because it contracts the pupil in exactly the same manner as does the disease (nervous effect). Secale will cure the latter condition for a similar reason (direct muscular effect), and the drugs cannot be used interchangeably because, while they are both upon the face of it symptomatically indicated, only the one is fulfilling all the requirements of the correct prescription.
Another illustration is the symptom, “difficulty in swallowing.” Gelsemium will remove this if it is due to a paralysis: Cantharides, when due to inflammation, and Agaricus when caused by muscular contraction. Here the suggestive symptom is the same for each remedy, but the pathology is different, in each instance the remedy must be selected according to the combined indications, the real totality.
Sometimes, in instance of this nature, enough study has been devoted to the pathology of drugs to enable us to prescribe scientifically, but in many more instances we know little or nothing at all concerning the mechanisms involved by drugs in the production of their symptoms. Examples are the heart symptoms of Spigelia; we know nothing at all about the influence of it upon the vagus, accelerators and the myocardium, or whether the effects are central or peripheral.
The cardiac symptoms of Spigelia have not been localized. Studies to determine information of this kind cannot be conducted upon human beings in many instances. Here is where the properly selected animal experimentation comes in to help out and carry on to completion information of this sort which, for obvious reasons, cannot be gained in the case of the human. The science of pharmacology is of the greatest help in this direction, and the proceedings and findings of pharmacological research are of immense importance to the homoeopathist.
The pharmacologist, by determining with exactitude the tissues and organs acted upon by medicine so that he can explain and locate their action, is putting to a practical application the Hahnemannian injunction of “individualizing the case.” When we add to our symptomatology of drugs his findings and utilize them in prescribing, we will he approximately a perfect materia medica.
With the great majority of our medicines we know absolutely nothing of the reactions involved in the cause of their symptoms. Sometimes an inference can be drawn from the effects produced; for example, we regard Kali carbonicum as affecting the lung. This, which is called the “clinical method,” is only applicable in case where the organ involved is of large size and the effects of the medicine upon it of gross action. It will never permit of a fine degree of symptom localization. How could it be determined in this manner that nicotine affects the pre – ganglionic fibers of the vagus or that Belladonna produces dryness of the throat and absence of salivary secretion by a toxic elimination of the function of the terminal nerve endings and not by paralysis of the gland cells?
