Peculiar to womanhood is the function of conveying nutrition. from the tissues of the mother across a thin membrane, which we call semi-permeable, to the developing embryo and conveying from the embryo eliminative products across, to and through the maternal kidneys. We might expect to learn from provings and clinical experience that an element such as potassium can influence the health of women in particular.
From physiology we can read that the ratio of potassium concentration to that of such other alkali ions as sodium, calcium, and magnesium controls the permeability of membranes, as glomeruli and tubules of kidneys and capillary vessels throughout the body. So we are not to be surprised on searching the repertory for some help in toxemia of pregnancy to discover a single remedy, Kali chloratum.
This year Kali chlor. has been a very present help in numerous patients with contagious or acute colds in which very sore throats predominated. They looked raw, patients said they felt raw and the pain on trying to swallow extended to one or to both ears. The nose was involved, as a fluid or dripping type of coryza was often but not always present.
When a pregnant patient presented edema of the feet or ankles and this sore throat, at the time of the sore throats of our general epidemic, then I was glad to remember the single remedy,
Kali chlor., for nausea of pregnancy for it acts fast and effectively in restoring comfort and removing this threat to peace of mind. Sometimes one thinks that the patient has mixed up her dates when in truth in ought to be considered whether fetal development cannot be arrested for as much as a week or more by illness which is shared by the unborn child.
If the remedy is Kali chlor. of Kali mur. or the nosode Diphtherinum, I have though I could detect this. Motion slowed very much during the “cold” and was actively resumed within a few hours after the remedy was given and term seemed lengthened by precisely as many days of those during which motion was absent and the “cold” or sore throat present. I have also seen more than once a seemingly “tedious” labor unmasked as a false labor when pains were irregular, even though descent and dilatation were both proceeding.
Pains entirely ceased within an hour after giving a proper remedy-in one case Bachs nosode with very prompt normal labor a week later, and no pains between times; in another case the remedy Secale performed the same feat where the cord was less than six inches long. This labor was characterized by erratic pains because the cord was apparently too short to permit rapid descent. After cessation for about eight hours, the delivery was accomplished easily, it being an eighth child.
But these cases differed from the asthenic type where labor seems delayed because of a weakness and even inborn malignant strain in the mother, when Kali. phos. seems to supply the strength for the ordeal and permits labor to set in and proceed after it seems delayed for no assignable reason. You all know the value of Kali carb, when symptoms of backache, haemorrhage and stabbing pains follow delivery at once or a week or more later. But Kali sulph. often clears where Pulsatilla fails me for catarrhal conditions after puerperium.
Now that early morning aggravation of Kali carb. has a pretty explanation. Our astrophysicists, who swing their telescopes on interstellar space, pass the night sky light through spectrograms and identify the line spectra seen and tell us there is potassium in interstellar space, one of the few elements identified there, and we should never forget that one of the isotopes of potassium-the rare one of atomic weight 40-is weakly radioactive, since radioactive particles are being released around as these modern days.
Potassium ferrocyanatum and potassium per manganum have also some relationships to diphtheria-toxin-treated patients and carries and I have seen them work well but have no provings to offer you. I suspect abuse of diphtheria toxin to show up in toxic cases during pregnancy and aim to keep these last two in mind for them and for carries.
SAGINAW.
LAPPER, MICHIGAN
DISCUSSION.
DR. ALLAN D. SUTHERLAND (Brattleboro, Vt.): I simply want to compliment Dr. Rood on an extremely able paper. This has really been one of the best papers on obstetrics that I have heard at the I.H.A. I have not had very much experience with the potassium salts as remedies. I think almost all of us have little pet groups of remedies which we are accustomed to use and we tend to see indications for those remedies. It may perhaps be due to climatic conditions or locality conditions that certain groups of remedies seem to be our per ones. I havent figured that out yet.
We try to be as objective as we can in the approach to the selection of a remedy. If that is the case, why is it that certain groups seem to suit a man in a certain locality? There must be a reason for that other than his own predilection to use it, because we try to base our choice on the indications in the patient.
In closing, I should like to thank Dr. Rood again for this paper. It is good!.
DR. H. A. NEISWANDER (Pandora, Ohio); The paper is interesting to me. It is very, very good.
In my experience in surgery, gynecology and obstetrics, there is a use for our homoeopathic remedies in any one of these fields. Even though we dont do surgery ourselves, we have surgical cases we have to take care of, and minor surgeries we take care of ourselves, and in obstetrics and gynecology certainly Homoeopathy means great deal to us. When it comes to obstetrics, in the potassium group of remedies, the one that has done the most for me is Kali carb., and I have used it time after time at delivery, particularly when they have these terrific back pains. Begin with a dose of Kali carb. and the condition corrects itself in a very short time.
DR.F.K.BELLOKOSSY (Denver, Col.): I should like to ask Dr. Rood if there is any proving of Kali chloricum. I dont think we have any proving of it.
DR. VIRGINIA JOHNSON (Chicago, III): I think it is in Allens Encyclopaedia.
DR. A.C. NEISWANDER (Alhambra, California): Boericke has some in his book.
DR. JOHNSON. When Dr. Nair closed her office, she gave me a few remedies and mixtures, and Kali chloricum 3x was in with them, and I found it in one of the older books.
DR. F.K.BELLOKOSSY (Denver, Col.): It there much difference between Kali muriaticum and Kali chloricum?.
DR. ROOD: I think what they call Kali chlor. is the “chlorate.” You have potassium chlorate which is Kali chloricum, and potassium chloride which is Kali muriaticum.
DR. BELLOKOSSY: Potassium chloride is Kali muriaticum and the other is Kali chlor?.
DR. ROOD: Potassium chlorate is Kali chlor.
DR. CHARLES A. DIXON (Akron, Ohio): Those of you who have back numbers of The Recorder, if I am correct in my impression, will find a very nice article on Kali chloratum by Dr. Roberts. I heard him give that paper at our school and get a copy of it, which I have used ever since. It is a grand good remedy on these streptococcic throats.
DR. JOHNSON: What year?.
DR. DIXON: It must be at least fifteen years ago. I dont know. I dont remember.
DR. SUTHERLAND : I think Clarks Dictionary has a short section on Kali chloratum.
