Category: Materia Medica

PREFACE NINTH EDITION

In preparing the ninth edition of this work, I have followed the lines laid out for all the previous editions, namely, to present in a condensed form the homśopathic Materia Medica for practical use.

The book contains the well known verified characteristic symptoms of all our medicines besides other less important symptoms aiding the selection of the curative remedy, All the new medicines and essentials of the published clinical experience of the school have been added. In its present compact form it contains the maximum number of reliable Materia Medica facts in the minimum space.

I have tried to give a succinct resume of the symptomatology of every medicine used in Homśopathy, including also clinical suggestions of many drugs so far not yet based on provings, thus offering the opportunity to experiment with these and by future provings discover their distinctive use and so enlarging our armamentarium.

I am aware that there is a difference of opinion about the advisability of further introduction of remedies, especially of such as seem obsolete or to some minds illusory. But it is not for the compiler to leave out information about any substance that has received the clinical endorsement from a reliable source.

Our Materia Medica must include all substances which have been proved and which have been used with apparent efficacy. It rests with the individual student to judge for himself the accuracy and, reliability of such observation. In this connection, I cannot forego to avail myself of the high authority of that master of Homśopathy, Dr. Constantine Hering, favoring the introduction of all remedies capable of producing reactions in the body that may guide to their medicinal employment. “Homśopathy is essentially not only many-sided but all-sided. She investigates the action of all substances, whether articles of diet, beverages, condiments, drugs or poisons. She investigates their action on the healthy, the sick, animals and plants. She gives; a new interpretation to that ancient, oft quoted saying of Paul, Prove all things–a new meaning, a new application that acts universally. Elimination of the useless may gradually take place with the growth of accurate physiological and pathological knowledge.”

Again, imperfectly proved remedies necessitate the use of names of diseases at times instead of the component symptoms that alone are the legitimate guide to the choice of the curative remedy. Here, too, I have Hering as pioneer guide for the ligitimacy of this method, which he also followed in his great work, the Guiding Symptoms. He said that he used the disease designations not for the purpose of recommending the particular remedy for that disease, but to show the great variety of remedies that may be used for any form of disease when otherwise indicated. For the same reason I have included nosological terms in the symptomatology and Therapeutic Index, as this is a practical handbook for every-day service, and any aid for finding the curative remedy ought to be utilized. As Dr. J. Compton Burnett expresses it:

“The fact is we need any and every way of finding the right remedy; the simple simile, the simple symptomatic similimum and the farthest reach of all-the pathologic similimum, and I maintain that we are still well within the line- of Homśopathy that is expansive, progressive, science fostered and science fostering.”

The dosage needs some apology. It is, of course, suggestive only; more often to be wholly disregarded. I have followed the lines of the earlier Homśopathists in this regard, and given what was then considered the usual range of potency, to which I have added my own experience and that of many observing practitioners. Every teacher of Materia Medica is constantly importuned by students to suggest the potency–something to start with at least.

The book is in no sense a treatise, and must not be considered or judged as such. It is as accurate and reliable a compilation and the fullest collection of verified Materia Medica facts and clinical suggestions as it is possible to obtain within the compass of the volume. It supplements every other work on Materia Medica, and if used as a ready reminder of the essential facts of our vast symptomatology and as an introduction to the larger books of reference and record of provings, it will fulfill its purpose and prove a useful aid to the student and general practitioner. As such it is again offered with much appreciation of past endorsement to his professional brethren.

I have been aided in seeing this edition through the press by the efficient help of Mr. F. O. Ernesty, who has lightened the labor of making the manuscript more acceptable to the printers, and I desire to express my hearty appreciation of this kind and helpful service.

BOERICK MD

  • Argentum Metallicum

    The Metal. (Pure Silver)

    Tall, thin, irritable persons. Ailments from abuse of Mercury. Constitutional effects of onanism. Affects the cartilages, tarsal, ears, nose, Eustachian; the structures entering into joints. Seminal emissions: after onanism; almost every night; without erection; with atrophy of penis. Crushed pain in the testicles (Rhod.). Prolapsus; with pain in left ovary and back, extending forward and downward (right ovary, Pal.); climacteric haemorrhage. Exhausting, fluent coryza with sneezing. Hoarseness; of professional singers, public speakers (Alum., Arum. t.). Total loss of voice of professional singers. Throat and larynx feel raw or sore on swallowing or coughing. Laughing excites cough (Dros., Phos., Stan.) and produces profuse mucus in larynx. When reading aloud has to hem and hawk; cough with easy expectoration of gelatinous, viscid mucus, looking like boiled starch. Great weakness of the chest (Stan.); worse left side. Alternation in timbre of voice with singers and public speakers (Arum t.). Raw spot over bifurcation of the trachea. worse when using voice, talking or singing.

    Relation. – Follows well: after, Alum. Similar: to, Stan. in cough excited by laughing.

    Aggravation. – Riding in a carriage (Coc.); when touched or pressed upon; talking, singing, reading aloud.

  • Apocynum Cannabinum

    Indian Hemp. (Apocynaceae)

    Excretions diminished, especially urine and sweat. Dropsy of serous membranes; acute, inflammatory. Dropsy: with thirst (Acet. ac.), water disagrees or is vomited (Ars.); most cases uncomplicated with organic diseases; after typhus, typhoid, scarlatina, cirrhosis; after abuse of quinine. Acute hydrocephalus, with open sutures; stupor, sight of one eye lost; constant and voluntary motion of one arm and one leg (left arm and leg, Bry.); forehead projected. Amenorrhoea in young girls, with bloating or dropsical extension of abdomen and extremities. Metorrhagia: continued or paroxysmal flow; fluid or clotted; nausea, vomiting, palpitation; pulse quick, feeble, when moved; vital depression, fainting, when raising head from pillow. Cough, short and dry, or deep and loose, during pregnancy (Con.).

    Relations. – Similar: to, Acetic Acid, Apis (no thirst), Ars., Cinch., Dig., in dropsical affections. Blatta orientalis has cured bad cases of general dropsy, after Apis, Apoc. and Dig. failed. – Haynes.

  • Apis Mellifica

    Poison of the Honey Bee (Apium virus.)

    Adapted to the strumous constitution; glands enlarged, indurated; scirrhus or open cancer. Women, specially widows; children and girls who, though generally careful, become awkward, and let things fall while handling them (Bov.). Bad effects of acute exanthema imperfectly developed or suppressed (Zinc.); measles, scarlatina, urticaria. Ailments from jealousy, fright, rage, vexation, bad news. Irritable; nervous; fidgety; hard to please. Weeping disposition; cannot help crying; discouraged, despondent (Puls.). Sudden shrill, piercing screams from children while waking or sleeping (Hellebore). Oedema; bag-like, puffy swelling under the eyes (over the eyes, Kali c.); of the hands and feet, dropsy, without thirst (with thirst, Acet. ac., Apoc.). Extreme sensitiveness to touch (Bell., Lach.). Pain: burning, stinging, sore; suddenly migrating from one part to another (Kali bi., Lac c., Puls.). Thirstlessness: in anasarca; acites (Acetic acid, but face more waxy and great thirst). Incontinence of urine, with great irritation of the parts; can scarcely retain the urine a moment, and when passed scalds severely; frequent, painful, scanty, bloody. Constipation: sensation in abdomen as if something tight would break if much effort were used. Diarrhoea: of drunkards; in eruptive diseases, especially if eruption be suppressed; involuntary from every motion, as though anus were wide open (Phos.). Affects right side; enlargement or dropsy of right ovary; right testicle. Intermittent fever; chill 3 p. m., with thirst, always (Ign.); < warm room and from external heat (Thuja, 3 a. m., and at 3 p. m.).

    Relations. – Complementary: Nat. mur. Disagrees, when used either before or after Rhus. Ars. and Puls. follow Apis well. Has cured scarlatina albuminuria after Canth., Dig., Hell. failed.

    Aggravation. – After sleeping (Lach.); closed, especially warmed and heated rooms are intolerable; from getting wet (Rhus), but better from washing or moistening the part in cold water.

    Amelioration. – Open air; cold water or cold bathing; uncovering; pains by coughing, walking or changing position; when sitting erect;

  • Zincum Metallicum

    Zinc. (The Element.)

    Persons suffering from cerebral and nervous exhaustion; defective vitality; brain or nerve power wanting; too weak to develop exanthemata or menstrual function, to expectorate, to urinate; to comprehend, to memorize. Incessant and violent fidgety feeling in feet or lower extremeties; must move them constantly. Always feels better every way as soon as the menses begin to flow; it relieves all her sufferings; but they return again soon after the flow ceases. In the cerebral affections: in impending paralysis of brain; where the vis medicatrix naturae is too weak to develop exanthemata (Cup., Sulph., Tub.); symptoms of effusion into ventricles. Child repeats everything said to it. Child cries out during sleep; whole body jerks during sleep; wakes frightened, starts, rolls the head from side to side; face alternately pale and red. Convulsions: during dentition, with pale face, no heat, except perhaps in occiput, no increase in temperature (rev. of Bell.); rolling the eyes; gnashing the teeth. Automatic motion of hands and head, or one hand and head (Apoc., Bry., Hell.). Chorea: from suppresse eruption; from fright. Hunger: ravenous, about 11 or 12 a. m. (Sulph.); great greediness when eating; cannot eat fast enough (incipient brain disease in children). Excessive nervous moving of feet, in bed for hours after retiring, even when asleep. Feet sweaty and more about toes; fetid, suppressed foot-sweat; very nervous. Chillblains, painful, < from rubbing. Spinal affections; burning whole length of spine; backache much < from sitting > by walking about (Cobalt., Puls., Rhus). Spinal irritation; great prostration of strength. Cannot bear back touched (Chin. s., Taren., Ther.). Can only void urine while sitting bent backwards. Twitching and jerking of single muscles (Agar., Ign.). Weakness and trembling of extremities; of hands while writing; during menses. During sweat, cannot tolerate any covering.

    Relations. – Compare: Hell., Tuber., in incipient brain diseases from suppressed eruptions.

    Aggravation. – Of many symptoms from drinking wine, even a small quantity (Alum., Con.).

    Amelioration. – Symptoms: of chest, by expectoration; of bladder, by urinating; of back, by emissions (< by Cobalt.); general, by menstrual flow. Is followed well by, Ign., but not by Nux, which disagrees.

    Inimical – Cham., and Nux; should not be used before or after.

  • Veratrum Viride

    Green Hellebore. (Melanthaceae.)

    For full-blooded, plethoric persons. Congestion, especially to base of brain, chest, spine and stomach. Violent pains attending inflammation. Acute rheumatism, high fever, full, hard rapid pulse, sever pains in joints and muscles (Bry., Salic. ac.); scanty, red urine. Child trembles, jerks, threatened with convulsions; continual jerking or nodding of the head. Nervous or sick headache; congestion from suppressed menses; intense, almost apoplectic, with violent nausea and vomiting. Congestive apoplexy, hot head, bloodshot eyes, thick speech, slow full pulse, hard as iron. Convulsions: dim vision; basilar meningitis; head retracted; child on verge of spasms. Cerebro-spinal diseases; with spasms, dilated pupils, tetanic convulsions, opisthotonos; cold clammy perspiration. Sunstroke, head full, throbbing of arteries, sensitive to sound, double or partial vision (Gels., Glon.). Tongue: white or yellow with red streak down the middle; dry, moist, white or yellow coating, or no coating on either side; feels scalded (Sang.). Pulse: suddenly increases and gradually deceases below normal; slow, soft, weak; irregular, intermittent (Dig., Tab.). Veratrum viride should not be given simply to “bring down the pulse,” or”control the heart’s action,” but like any other remedy for the totalityof the symptoms.

  • Veratrum Album

    While Hellebore. (Melanthaceae.)

    For children and old people; the extremes of life; persons who are habitually cold and deficient in vital reaction; young people of a nervous sanguine temperament. Adapted to diseases with rapid sinking of the vital forces; complete prostration; collapse. Cold perspiration on the forehead (over entire body, Tab.); with nearly all complaints. Cannot bear to be left alone; yet persistently refuses to talk. Thinks she is pregnant or will soon be delivered. Mania with desire to cut and tear everything, especially clother (Taran.); with lewd, lascivious talk, amorous or religious (Hyos., Stram.). Attacks of fainting from least exertion (Carbo v., Sulph.); excessive weakness. Sinking feeling during haemorrhage (fainting, Trill.). Sensation of a lump of ice on vertex, with chilliness (Sep.); as of heat and cold at same time on scalp; as if brain were torn to pieces. Face: pale, blue, collapsed; features sunkden, hippocratic; red while lying, becomes pale on rising up (Acon.). Thirst: intense, unquenchable, for large quantities of very cold water and acid drinks; wants everything cold. Craving for acids or refreshing things (Phos. ac.). Ice coldness: of face, tip of nose, feet, legs, hands, arms, and many other parts. Cold feeling in abdomen (Colch., Tab.). Violent vomiting with profuse diarrhoea. Vomiting: excessive with nausea and great prostration: < by drinking (Ars.); by least motion (Tab.); great weakness after. Cutting pain in abdomen as from knives. Cholera: vomiting and purging; stool, profuse, watery, gushing, prostrating; after fright (Acon.). Diarrhoea: frequent, greenish, watery, gushing: mixed with flakes: cutting colic, with cramps commencing in hands and feet and spreading all over; prostrating, after fright; < least movement; with vomiting, cold sweat on forehead during and prostration after (Ars., Tab.). Constipation: no desire; stool large, hard (Bry., Sulph.); in round, black balls (Chel., Op., Plb.); from inactive rectum; frequent desire felt in epigastrium (Ign. – in rectum, Nux); painful, of infants and children, after Lyc., and Nux. Dysmenorrhoea: with vomiting and purging, or exhausting diarrhoea with cold sweat (Amm. c., Bov.); is so weak can scarcely stand for two days at each menstrual nisus (Alum., Carbo an., Coc.). Bad effects of opium eating, tabacco chewing. Pains in the limbs during wet weather, getting worse from warmth of bed, better by continued walking. In congestive or pernicious intermittent fever, with extreme coldness, thirst, face cold and collapsed; skin cold and clammy, great prostration; cold sweat on forehead and deathly pallor on face.

    Relations. – After: Ars., Arn., Cinch., Cup., Ipec. After Camph. in cholera and cholera morbus. After Amm. c., Carbo v. and Bov., in dysmenorrhoea with vomiting and purging.

    Aggravation. – From least motion; after drinking; before and during menses; during stool; when perspiring; after fright. Often removes bad effects of excessive use of alcohol and tabacco.

  • Variolinum

    Pus from smallpox pustule. (A Nosode.)

    Only fragmentary provings. Bears the same relation to smallpox that Antitoxin does to diphtheria. An extended clinical record by competent and reliable observers attest its curative value in variola – simple, confluent and malignant – as well as in varioloid and varicella. It has done splendid work in all potencies, from the 6th cent. to the c. m. As a preventive of, or protection against, smallpox, it is far superior to crude vaccination and absolutely safe from the sequenae, especially septic and tubercular infection. The efficacy of the potency is the stumbling block to the materialist. But is it more difficult to comprehend than the infectious nature of variola, measles or pertusis? Those who have not used, like those who have not experimentally tested the law of similars, are not competent witnesses. Put it to the test and publish the failures to the world.

  • Valeriana

    Valerian. (Valerianaceae.)

    Excessive nervous excitability; hysterical nervous temperament (Ign., Puls.); persons in whom the intellectual faculties predominate; changeable disposition. Red parts become white (Fer.). Feels light as if floating in the air (Asar., Lac c., – as if legs were floating Sticta). Oversensitiveness of all the senses (Cham., Nux). Sensation of great coldness in head (on vertex, Sep., Ver.). Sensation as if a thread were hanging down throat (on tongue, Nat. Sil.). Child vomits: curdled milk, in large lumps; same in stools (Aeth.); as soon as it has nursed, after mother has been angry. Sciatica: pain < when standing and letting foot rest on floor (Bell.); when straightening out limb, during rest from previous exertion; > when walking.

    Relations. – Compare: Asaf., Asar., Croc., Ign., Lac c., Spig., Sulph. For the abuse of Chamomile tea. For pains in heels: Agar., Caust., Cyc., Led., Mang., Phyt.

  • Tuberculinum-Bacillinum

    Pus (with bacilli) from tubercular abscess (A Nosode.)

    Note: *The potencies of Fincke and Swan were prepared from a drop of pus obtained from a pulmonary tubercular abscess or sputa. Those of Heath from a tuberculous lung in which the bacillus tuberculosis had been found microscopically; hence the former was called Tuberculinum and the latter Bacillinum. Both preparations are reliable and effective.

    Adapted to persons of light complexion; blue eyes, blonde in preference to brunette; tall slim, flat, narrow chest; active and precocious mentally, weak physically; the tubercular diathesis. When the family history of tubercular affections the best selected remedy fails to relieve or permanently improve, without reference to name of disease. Symptoms ever changing; ailments affecting one organ, then another – the lungs, brain, kidneys, liver, stomach, nervous system – beginning suddenly, ceasing suddenly. Takes cold easily without knowing how or where; seems to take cold “every time he takes a breath of fresh air” (Hep.). Emaciation rapid and pronounced; losing flesh while eating well (Abrot., Calc., Con., Iod., Nat.). Melancholy, despondent; morose, irritable, fretful, peevish; taciturn, sulky; naturally of a sweet disposition, now on the borderland of insanity. Everything in the room seemed strange, as though in a strange place. Headache: chronic, tubercular; pain intense, sharp, cutting, from above right eye to occiput; as of an iron hoop round the head (Anac., Sulph.); when the best selected remedy only palliates. School-girl’s headache: < by study or even slight mental exertion; when using eyes in close work and glasses fail to >; with a tubercular history. Acute cerebral or basilar meningitis, with threatened effusion; nocturnal hallucinations; wakes from sleep frightened, screaming; when Apis, Hell., or Sulph., though well selected, fail to improve. Crops of small boils, intensely painful, successively appear in the nose; green, fetid pus (Sec.). Plica polonica; several bad cases permanently cured after Bor. and Psor. failed. Diarrhoea: early morning, sudden, imperative (Sulph.); emaciating though eating well (Iod., Nat.); stool dark, brown, watery, offensive; discharged with great force; great weakness and profuse night sweats. Menses: too early; too profuse; too long-lasting; tardy in starting; with frightful dysmenorrhoea; in patients with a tubercular history. Tubercular deposit begins in apex of lungs, usually the left (Phos., Sulph., Ther.). Eczema: tubercular over entire body; itching intense, < at night when undressing, from bathing; immense quantities of white bran-like scales; oozing behind the ears, in the hair, in folds of skin with rawness and soreness; fiery red skin. Ringworm.

    Relations. – Complementary: Psor., Sulph. When Psor., Sulph., or the best selected remedy fails to relieve or permanently improve; follows Psor. as a constitutional remedy in hay fever, asthma. Belladonna, for acute attacks, congestive or inflammatory, occurring in tubercular diseases. Hydrastis to fatten patients cured with Tuber.

  • Trillium Pendulum

    Wake Robin (Smilaceae)

    Haemorrhage: copious, both active and passive, usually bright red; from nose, lungs, kidneys and uterus (Ipec., Mill.). Tendency to puterescence of fluids. Epistaxis; profuse, passive, bright red. Bleeding from cavity after extraction of a tooth (Ham., Kreos.). Menses: profuse, every two weeks, lasting a week or longer (Calc. p.); after over-exertion or too long a ride. Flooding, with fainting. Menorrhagia: flow, profuse, gushing, bright red; at least movement (Sab.); from displaced uterus; at the climacteric; every two weeks, dark, clotted (Thlas., Ust.). Haemoptysis: incipient phthisis, with bloody sputa; in advanced stages with copious, purulent expectoration and troublesome cough. Sensation as if hips and small of back were falling to pieces; as if sacro-iliac synhrondroses were falling apart, wants to be bound tightly; as if bones of pelvis were broken (Aesc.); with haemorrhage. Profuse uterine haemorrhage t climacteric; flow every two weeks; pale, faint, dim sight, palpitation, obstruction and noises in ears (Fer.); painful sinking at pit of stomach.

    Relations. – Complementary: to Cal. p., in menstrual and haemorrhagic affections. Compare: Cinch., Bell., Kali c., Mill., Lach., Sep., Sulph., Thlas., Ust.