New, Old, and Forgotten Remedies Part 49

1848. _New Manual or Symptomen Codex.--Jahr._ Translated by Hempel, vol.

2, p. 573. (This is a singularly incomplete translation from the German _Kodex_, with no reference to any source. A literal copy of this translation is all there is of _Pothos foet._ in the _Encyclopaedia_.

It omits the only symptom in the _Correspondenzblatt_ abstract that made my application of this remedy not purely empirical.)

1851. _Jahr's New Manual._ Edited by Hull, 3d ed., vol. 1, p. 797.

1851. _Characteristik der Hom. Arzneien._ Possart, part 2, p. 506.

1860. "_Hull's Jahr._" _A New Manual of Hom. Practice._ Edited by Snelling, 4th ed., vol. 1, p. 977.

1866. _Text-Book of Mat. Med._ Lippe, p. 545.

1878. _Encyclopaedia of Pure Materia Medica._ Allen, vol. 9, p. 155.

1884. _American Medicinal Plants._ Millspaugh, vol. 1, p. 169.

POTHOS FOETIDA SYMPTOMATOLOGY.

Translated from the _Correspondenzblatt_ by T. C. Fanning, M. D., Tarrytown, N. Y.[M]

[M] Literalness rather than elegance has been sought in the translating.

Because the odor is quite like Mephitis it is considered a so-called anti-spasmodic.

_Abstract of symptoms from Hering, Humphreys, and Lingen._

So absent-minded and thoughtless that he enters the sick rooms without knocking; pays no attention to those speaking to him. Irritable, inclined to contradict; violent.

Headache of brief duration, in single spots, now here, now there, with confusion. Pressure in both temples, harder on one side than on the other alternately, with violent pulsation of the temporal arteries.

Drawing in the forehead in two lines from the frontal eminences to the glabella, where there is a strong outward drawing as if by a magnet.

Red swelling, like a saddle, across the bridge of the nose, painful to the touch, especially on the left side near the forehead, while the cartilaginous portion is cold and bloodless; with red spots on the cheek, on the left little pimples; swelling of the cervical and sub-maxillary glands.

Unpleasant numb sensation in the tongue; cannot project it against the teeth; papillae elevated; tongue redder, with sore pain at point and edge.

Burning sensation from the fauces down through the chest. With the desire to smoke, tobacco tastes badly.

Pain in the scrobiculus cordis as if something broke loose, on stepping hard.

_Inflation and tension in the abdomen_; bellyache here and there in single spots; on walking, feeling as if the bowels shook, without pain.

Stool earlier (in the morning), frequent, softer.

Urging to urinate; very dark urine.

Painful, voluptuous tickling in the whole of the glans p.e.n.i.s.

Violent sneezing, causing pain in the roof of the mouth, the fauces and oesophagus all the way to the stomach, followed by long-continued pains at the cardiac orifice.

Pain in chest and _mediastinum postic.u.m_, less in the _antic.u.m_, with pain under the shoulders, which seems to be in connection with burning in the oesophagus. Pressing pain on the sternum.

Sudden feeling of anxiety, with difficult (or oppressed) respiration and sweat, followed by stool and the subsidence of these and other pains.

Inclination to take deep inspirations with hollow feeling in the chest, later with contraction in the fauces and chest.

The difficulty of breathing is better in the open air.

Pain in the crest of the right tibia.

Rheumatic troubles increased.

Sleepy early in the evening.

All troubles disappear in the open air.

In attempting to a.n.a.lyze this "abstract of symptoms," to see if the internal evidence tends to show that the recorded effects are genuine results of the drug, it is well to remember that these provings--for we infer that three observers partic.i.p.ated therein--were made in the light of the empirical history of _Pothos foet._ The said history was on record before the date of these provings, and it cannot have escaped Hering's eye; he was too wide a reader for that. He was, beyond doubt, aware of the pathogenetic effects observed by Bigelow--_headache_, _vertigo_, _temporary blindness_, _vomiting_, _even from small quant.i.ties_. Having, then, this clue to its physiological action, these symptoms should reappear in his proving _if his imagination furnished his symptoms_. As only a mild headache is noted in the _Correspondenzblatt_, it is evident that these provers did not _work from a pattern_. It is also evident that the _usus in morbis_ did not suggest the Allentown symptomatology, for the anti-asthmatic virtue of _Pothos foet._ is one feature on which the greatest stress had been laid, and yet the only _pathogenetic_ suggestion of its applicability in asthma is: "_Sudden feeling of anxiety with difficult_ (or oppressed) respiration and sweat, followed by stool and the _subsidence of these and other pains_." Who ever heard of an asthma relieved by stool? Who could have _invented_ such an odd modality? As it stands it is an _unic.u.m_, and by every rule of criticism this single symptom-group gives the stamp of verity to the Allentown "abstract of symptoms." But there is other and singularly convincing evidence of the genuineness of this abstract. As the reader is aware, Thacher had emphasized the efficiency of _Pothos foet._ as an anti-spasmodic in hysteria, although the "key-note" that indicates it in hysteria had wholly escaped his discernment.

Now this very "key-note" appears in the Allentown pathogenesis, but so un.o.btrusively as to show most conclusively that the prover who furnished it did not recognize its singular import and value. Such testimony is absolutely unimpugnable by honest and intelligent criticism.

It is also apparent that some of the less p.r.o.nounced of its empirical virtues are reflected in the proving. For instance, Thacher found it efficacious in "erratick pains of a spasmod.i.c.k nature." Is not this "erratic" feature reproduced in such conditions as:

"Headache, of brief duration, in single spots, now here, now there?"

"Pressure in both temples alternately, harder on one side than on the other?"

"Bellyache, here and there, in single spots?"

Brevity of duration and recurrence "in single spots, now here, now there," are phenomena at once _spasmodic_ and _erratic_. It must be admitted that the trend of its pathogenetic action and the lines of its therapeutical application are parallel, and, therefore, that the latter are confirmatory of the former.

With such an anti-hysterical reputation as the empirical use had given to _Pothos foet._, it might fairly be antic.i.p.ated that its pathogenesis would be distinguished by a paucity of objective _data_, for only a tyro in pharmacodynamics, or a "Regular," would expect to find a full-lined picture of hysteria in any "proving." And so we have in the "abstract" a flux of subjective symptoms, "erratic" enough for hysterical elements, and still further characterized by an apparent evanescence, as if its phenomena of sensory disturbance were as fleeting and unsubstantial as those of an hysterical storm.

The _will-o'-the-wisp-like_ character of its subjective symptoms, and its physometric property (hinted at in the pathogenesis and emphasized in Thacher's case) are the features that will chiefly impress one in studying this distinctively American remedy.

That the "abstract of symptomes" evinces a cautious trial of this drug, and that more heroic experiments will add to our knowledge of its pathogenetic properties, are plain deductions from the absence in the "abstract" of such p.r.o.nounced effects as Bigelow observed and also from the evidence of the _usus in morbis_. The remedy needs an efficient proving, especially in the female organism.

AN APPLICATION OF POTHOS FOETIDA.

Miss B----, aet. 20; a tall, spare brunette, and a good specimen of Fothergill's _Arab type_, brainy and vivacious. General health has been good, but she was never robust; could not go to school regularly.

Between her thirteenth and fifteenth years grew rapidly in stature, and then she was easily wearied on walking; knees tired and limbs ached. Had good digestion through the growing period, but subsequently became subject to "bloat of wind" in abdomen. These meteoristic attacks came when lying down. A "weight rises from the abdomen up to the heart." She must at once spring up. This condition is relieved by eructating, by liquor, and by drinking hot water. The night attacks of meteorism are by far the worst. _She is now subject to them._

[Her grand-mother had such "spells of bloating;" would spring out of bed at night, lose consciousness, and "bloat up suddenly." If she had such an attack when dressed, they had often been obliged to cut open her clothes.]

Patient has found that apples, tomatoes, cabbage and onions disagree with her; no other food. She is constipated--"wants to and can't."

Her hair is unusually dry; scalp full of dandruff; skin, generally, soft and flexible.

She has frequent epistaxis; has had four and five attacks a day. Blood bright red, "runs a perfect stream," does not clot at the nostrils. Has previously a "heavy feeling" in the head, which the bleeding relieves.