Belladonna Fever Symptoms


Allen gives the therapeutic indications of the remedy Belladonna in different kinds of fevers like: Continued, Bilious, Intermittent, Malarial, Remittent, Pernicious, Typhoid, Typhus, Septic fever, etc…


Fever

Characteristic – Adapted to bilious, lymphatic, plethoric constitutions, persons who are jovial and entertaining when well, but violent and often delirious when sick.

Women and children, with light hair, blue eyes, fine complexion, delicate skin, sensitive, nervous, threatened with convulsions.

Great liability to take cold, sensitive to draft of air, especially when uncovering the head, from having the hair cut (Hepar), tonsils swell after riding in a cold wind (Aconite, Hepar, Rhus.).

Over – excitability of all the senses, convulsions during dentition, spasms of single muscles or the whole body, chorea, epilepsy.

Quick sensation and motion, eyes snap and move quickly.

Convulsions during teething, with fever (without fever, Mag- p.), come on suddenly, head hot, feet cold.

Rush of blood to head and face (Amyl, Gloninum, Melilotus).

Pains come on suddenly, last indefinitely, cease suddenly (Mag-p.).

Pains: usually in short attacks, cause redness of face and eyes, with throbbing of carotids and fulness of head.

Imagines he sees ghosts, hideous faces, and various insects (Stramonium), black animals, dogs, wolves.

Fear of imaginary things, wants to run away from them, hallucinations.

Violent delirium, disposition to bite, spit, strike and tear things, breaks into fits of laughter and gnashes the teeth, wants to bite and strike the attendants (Stramonium), tries to escape (Helleborus, Hyoscyamus).

Head hot and painful, face flushed, eyes wild, staring, pupils dilated, pulse full and bounding, globules like buckshot striking the finger, mucous membrane of mouth dry, stool tardy, urine suppressed, sleepy but cannot sleep (Chamomilla, Lachesis, Opium).

Vertigo: when stooping, or when rising after stooping (Bryonia), on every change of position.

Headache: congestive, with red face, throbbing of brain and carotids (Melilotus), aggravated from slight noise, jar, motion, light, lying down, least exertion, ameliorated pressure, tight bandaging, wrapping up, during menses.

Boring the head into the pillow (Apis, Helleborus, Podophyllum, Tuberculinum).

Abdomen tender, distended aggravated by least jar, even of the bed, obliged to walk with great care for fear of a jar.

Pain in right ileo – cecal region. aggravated by slightest touch, even the bed – cover.

The transverse colon protrudes like a pad.

Skin: of a uniform, smooth, shining, scarlet redness, dry, hot, burning, imparts a burning sensation to examining hand, the true Sydenham scarlet fever, where eruption is perfectly smooth and truly scarlet.

Pressing downwards as if the contents of abdomen would issue from the vulva, ameliorated standing and sitting erect, worse mornings (compare, Lilium tigrinum, Murex, Sepia).

Relations – Complementary: Calcarea.

Belladonna is the acute of Calcarea and Tuberculinum which are often required to complete a cure.

Aggravation: From touch, motion, noise, draught of air, looking at bright shining objects (Lyssinum, Stramonium), after 3 p.m. and midnight, while drinking, uncovering, hot sun, lying down.

Amelioration: Rest, standing or sitting erect, warm room.

Type: Quotidian, tertian. sometimes the type is anticipating. Periodicity not marked. Continued, typhoid, yellow.

Time: 6 p.m. In evening, or at night.

Chill: Without thirst. Chill, beginning in both arms at once, thence spreads all over the body ( Helleborus – begins in extremities, Gel. ), a violent chill seized her in scrobiculus cordis, shivering running down the back, and terminating in pit of stomach (chill felt most severely in pit of stomach, Arnica – chill begins in pit of stomach with a fixed cold, agonizing weight, Calcarea ). Chill, alternating with dry, burning heat. Chill, with violent, bursting, frontal headache, dilated pupils, dread of light and noise, restlessness, pale face when lying down, red face when sitting up (the reverse of Aconite ). Congestive chill, with red face, delirium and bursting headache. Chill internal, with external burning heat. Feet ice – cold, can scarcely be warmed, while face is red and bloated (Arnica). Chill after eating (Kali carb., Ma.v.- chill after eating and drinking, Asarum europaeum ). Chilliness in the arms, with redness and heat of the ears and nose (with coldness of tip of nose during chill, Ced. ). Chilliness not relieved by heat of stove. Rarely any thirst, if any, it is during the alternate burning heat of the chill.

Heat: Intense, with great thirst and desire for cold water, yet everything he drinks feels as if too cold. Constant dry burning heat with sweat only on head. Burning heat within and without, burning heat of the body, with extreme distention of the superficial blood-vessels, the distended veins lie like cords on the skin (distention of veins and congestive headache, Cinchona ). Violent, bursting headache, with strong pulsations of arteries, especially throbbing of the carotids, dilated pupils, very red face, delirium, restlessness. External coldness of the body, and internal burning heat. Head sometimes ice-cold, sometimes burning hot. Face hot, with extremities cold, forehead hot, with cold head and cold cheeks ( Rhus ). Heat the predominant stage of the paroxysm. Averse to uncovering.

Sensitive to light and noise.

Sweat: Beginning at the feet and rising up to head, during heat, or immediately after it, mostly on face and down the nose, on covered parts only, or on covering parts ever so little ( Cinchona ), sweat stains linen yellow or dark, empyreumatic, smoky odor, profuse sweat with diuresis, sweat of head, hands, face (which is very red) and feet, with burning heat, profuse sweat over whole body by the least exercise ( Bryonia, Camp. ), sudden, evanescent, during sleep, day or night, with gradual relief of pain (Nat), may be entirely wanting.

Tongue: Red and dry, with red edges and white coating in the middle, papillae bright and prominent, like scarlatina ( Aconite, Ant-t. ) Offensive, putrid taste in throat when eating or drinking, although food tastes natural.

Pulse: Strong, full, large and frequent, globular, like buckshot, or small, wiry and hard, the former in chill and heat, the latter as paroxysm passes off. Throbbing of arteries.

Difference between Aconite and Belladonna

Aconite

Chill: Ascends from feet to chest. One hot cheek, contracted pupils. Red face when lying down, pale face and fainting when sitting up. Chilly from being touched, or even lifting bed clothes. Body chilly, forehead and ears hot. Heat: Redness and heat of one, coldness and paleness of the other cheek. Sensation of coldness in the blood-vessels. Likes to be uncovered. Sweat: Covered or affected parts sweat profusely. Sour smelling sweat all over the body. Tongue: Coated white “strawberry tongue.” Everything but water tastes bitter, taste of rotten eggs.

Belladonna

Chill: Begins in both arms at once, thence over body. Hot face, dilated pupils. Pale face when lying down, red face when sitting up. Chill after eating, with redness of the face. Chilliness, with redness and heat of ears and nose. Heat: Forehead hot, with cold face and cold cheeks. Distended superficial blood-vessels, like whip-cords on the skin. Averse to uncovering. Sweat: On covered parts only, or on covering parts ever so little. Sweat stains the linen yellow. Sweat of empyreumatic odor. Tongue: Red, dry, “scarlatina like,” mouth and fauces dry. Food tastes salty: bread sour.

“Where there is a doubt whether Aconite or Belladonna should be given, I have always found that a disposition to perspire constitutes a valuable indication for Belladonna.” Baehr.

It has been taught by some authors, and believed by many members of the homoeopathic faith, that Aconite and Belladonna- except as incurrents during the congestive stage of heat-are useless in the treatment of intermittent fever. But the law of cure, as enunciated by Hahnemann, knows no such narrow restrictions, and is not bound by the ipse dixit of individual opinion.

If Aconite or Belladonna cover the totality of the patient’s symptoms, it will as certainly cure this fever, as any other remedy. They are comparatively rarely indicated, but will effectually do their work when called for. The characteristic symptoms of the remedy must always be the guide.

Analysis: Congested, red, hot face, head and carotids throbbing, pupils dilated, cold extremities.

Heat, intense, burning within and without, great thirst, distended blood-vessels, aggravation uncovering.

Sweat, on covered parts only, or on covering slightly.

A typical Belladonna picture, irrespective of the paroxysm.

H. C. Allen
Dr. Henry C. Allen, M. D. - Born in Middlesex county, Ont., Oct. 2, 1836. He was Professor of Materia Medica and the Institutes of Medicine and Dean of the faculty of Hahnemann Medical College. He served as editor and publisher of the Medical Advance. He also authored Keynotes of Leading Remedies, Materia Medica of the Nosodes, Therapeutics of Fevers and Therapeutics of Intermittent Fever.