New, Old, and Forgotten Remedies Part 57

Dr. J. likewise "effected perfect cures with it in some troublesome spasmodic affections, and gave it with the most marked benefit in dry, irritating coughs, usually termed nervous. In the advanced stage of phthisis it procured a respite beyond his expectation. He also found it useful in restraining a troublesome hiccough."

Remembering the fame of _Mygale avicularia_ in ch.o.r.ea we may well expect this other spider to be of use "in some troublesome _spasmodic_ affections."

Dr. Chapman writes of it: "I have cured some obstinate intermittents, suspended the paroxysms of hectic, overcome morbid vigilance from excessive nervous mobility, and quieted irritation of the system from other causes, and particularly as connected with protracted coughs and other chronic pectoral affections. * * * * Some consider it as highly stimulant, invigorating the force of the pulse, increasing the temperature of the surface, and heightening excitement generally--others, witnessing no such effects, are disposed to a.s.sort it with those remedies which seem to do good _chiefly by soothing the agitations of the system_. I confess that I concur in the latter view of its properties."

How unconsciously the Philistines of Old Physic bear testimony to the truth of our therapeutic law. Given where "heightened excitement"

obtained, Chapman saw it "do good chiefly by soothing the agitations of the system," and to him, of course, cobweb was a sedative.

Dr. Broughton, in his Thesis, says: "In all the cases of disease in which I have seen or heard of the exhibition of the web, no sensible, or at least no uniform, operation could be observed. Some patients were sensible of none, others of a slight sudorific, and some a nauseatic effect; and one or two thought it proved cathartic after remaining in the system for the s.p.a.ce of twelve or fifteen hours. These accounts being so incorrect and various, I determined to ascertain (if possible) the correct operation by giving the web to healthy persons."

"I found from these experiments that the operation of the web appeared princ.i.p.ally to be upon the arterial system; and perhaps in less time than any article already known: the force and frequency of the pulse being uniformly reduced in some cases ten, in others fifteen strokes in a minute; and in one case, the pulse, from being strong and full, became soft, small, and very compressible; all which operation took place within the s.p.a.ce of two hours, after which time the artery gradually regained its former force and frequency. This has been the only invariable effect I could observe, all others appearing but anomalous."

Dr. Thacher cites the following case from a paper of Dr. Jackson's: "W.

Sands has been afflicted for many years with a distressing asthma, which has proved fatal to his father and two sisters. The complaint being hereditary, and aggravated by malformation of the thorax, no remedy gave any permanent relief, nor did change of climate procure any alleviation of symptoms. For a considerable time back he has never been able to lie down in bed on account of a sense of suffocation, but is obliged to be supported half sitting by pillows, and is seldom able to sleep. He swallowed nearly a scruple of the spider's web, he swallowed it at bed time, and to his utter astonishment enjoyed sound and uninterrupted sleep all night; a blessing to which he had been an entire stranger above six years. Since he began with the cobweb thinks his health is improved; the cough has certainly abated, but whenever the remedy is omitted the complaint returns."

Dr. Oliver found that "by the use of this remedy a patient laboring under organic disease of the heart and hydrothorax obtained great relief and refres.h.i.+ng sleep, who had not before slept for three nights.

Another, under similar affection, experienced uncommon relief from the same prescription. To one suffering much pain from cancer it afforded ease and comfortable sleep. A patient in phthisis pulmonalis being affected with distressing agitation of mind and nervous irritation, it answered like a charm, and soon induced great sleep like a moderate dose of opium."

THALLIUM.

PREPARATION.--Triturate the pure metal in the usual way.

(The following is from the _h.o.m.oeopathic World_, 1893):

In the "French News" column of the _Chemist and Druggist_ we came across a note on the effect of _Thallium_, which we have no doubt h.o.m.oeopaths will soon turn to good account. Here is the paragraph:--

CURIOUS EFFECT OF A REMEDY.

"Dr. Huchard read a paper at the last meeting of the Paris Academy of Medicine on _Acetate of Thallium_, which was formerly advocated by Dr.

Combemale, of Lille, as a medicament against profuse perspiration in certain cases of serious illness. It appears, however, that its useful influence is counterbalanced by the fact that it causes the hair to fall off with great rapidity. Dr. Huchard exhibited at the meeting several photographs of patients who had become quite bald in several days. He was consequently very emphatic against the use of the remedy."

There is all the difference between the two schools in this note. To the allopath this is a "curious effect" merely, and serves to condemn the drug. To the h.o.m.oeopathic it brings to light a new remedy for a troublesome affection which is by no means too well provided for.

_Thallium_ is a rare metal, whose atomic weight is 204.2, its symbol being Tl. It receives its name ([Greek: thallos], a green shoot) from the green line it gives on the spectrum, through which it was discovered by Crookes in the residuum left from the distillation of selenium.

_Thallium_ has a bluish white tint and the l.u.s.tre of lead; is so soft that it can be scratched by the finger nail. Specific gravity, 11.8. It belongs to the lead group of metals, but has peculiar reactions of its own. It is used in the manufacture of gla.s.s of high refractive power.

THLASPI BURSA PASTORIS.

NAT. ORD., Cruciferae.

COMMON NAME, Shepherd's Purse.

PREPARATION.--Three parts of the fresh plant in flower are macerated in two parts by weight of alcohol.

(The following paper on this remedy is by Dr. E. R.

Dudgeon and appeared in the _Monthly h.o.m.oeopathic Review_, 1888):

The _Art Medical_, for July, 1888, contains a paper on this plant by Dr.

Imbert Gourbeyre, displaying all his well-known ability and erudition.

Although an unproved remedy, its sphere of specific action is pretty accurately known, and in former days it was frequently employed by many eminent medical authorities. In our own days, though almost unknown to "scientific" medicine, it enjoys a considerable reputation in popular medicine, chiefly for haemorrhages, and profuse menstruation, and metrorrhagia.

According to Dioscorides, it is emmenagogue and abortive, anti-haemorrhagic, and a remedy for sciatica. In Salmon's _Doren Medic.u.m_ (1683) it is said: "The seed provokes urine and the courses, kills the _foetus_, resists poyson, breaks inward apostems, and, being taken in [Latin: ezh]ij, it purges cholera." In Vogel's _Historia Materiae Medicae_ we read of the seed: "Ischiaticis infusum prodesse, et menses ciere (Dioscorides). Sudorem pellere, et ad s...o...b..tum posse, si eb vius teratur, adiecto saccharo (Boerhaav)." It was called by the old herbalists _sanguinaria_--"quia sanguinem sistet." Murray, at the end of last century, p.r.o.nounced it useless; but De Maza, arguing against this opinion, relates a case of metrorrhagia cured by it, applied as a cataplasm to the loins, on the recommendation of an old woman, after the doctor had tried several medicines without effect. Lejeune (1822) says he has seen good results from its employment in haemoptysis.

Rademacher has a great opinion of it. He says: "This plant was held to be an anti-haemorrhagic medicine by the ancients. The superior wisdom of later physicians has p.r.o.nounced it to have no such power, _because it contains no astringent principle_! (Carheuser's _Mat. Med._) A second property attributed to it was that of stopping diarrhoea; a third, that of cutting short agues. I have lately used it repeatedly in chronic diarrhoea, when this is purely a primary affection of the bowels, with surprising benefit; but it is useless in consensual diarrhoea. I have not yet used it in ague, but would not dissuade others from trying it.

But the most important remedial power of this common innocuous plant I learned from no medical author; the knowledge of it was actually forced upon me by the following case: I was called to see a poor woman from whom, eight or ten years before, I had brought away a large quant.i.ty of urinary sand by means of magnesia and cochineal, and thereby cured her.

Now, the tiresome sand had again acc.u.mulated in the kidneys, and the patient was in a pitiable state. The abdominal cavity was full of water, the lower extremities swollen by oedema, and the urine of a bright red color, which formed, on standing, a sediment unmistakably of blood. I prescribed tincture of _Brusa pastoris_, 30 drops, 5 times a day, solely with the intention of stopping the haematuria as a preliminary; but imagine my astonishment when I found that the tincture caused a more copious discharge of renal sand than I had ever witnessed. Paracelsus's words occurred to me: 'A physician should overlook nothing; he should look down before him like a maiden, and he will find at his feet a more valuable treasure for all diseases than India, Egypt, Greece or Barbary can furnish.' I should certainly have been a careless fool had I, with this striking effect before me, changed to another medicine. I continued to give the tincture; I saw the urinary secretion increase with the copious discharge of sand; the water disappeared from the abdomen and extremities, and health was restored. I went on with the tincture until no more sand appeared in the urine, and I had every reason to suppose that the deposit of sand was completely removed. Since then I have used this remedy in so many cases with success that I can conscientiously recommend it to my colleagues as a most reliable remedy. Among these cases was one which appeared to me very striking. It was that of a woman, aged 30, who came to me for a complication of diseases. I examined the urine for sand, but found none. I gave her the tincture of _Brusa pastoris_, and a quant.i.ty of sand came away. On continuing the tincture much more sand came away, and her other morbid symptoms disappeared."

It was stated some time ago that Mattei's _anti-angioitico_ was a tincture of _Thlaspi bursa pastoris_, but, if we are to credit the statement of a periodical lately published, ent.i.tled _General Review of Electro-h.o.m.oeopathic Medicine_, this is not so, for _anti-angioitico_ is there stated to be a medicine compounded of _Aconite_, _Belladonna_, _Nux vomica_, _Veratrum alb.u.m_, and _Ferrum metallic.u.m_. I mention this inadvertently, but I do not suppose it is of much consequence, and my first experience of the remedial action of _Thlaspi_ was anterior to the information that it was one of Mattei's remedies.

In the 3d volume of the _British Journal of h.o.m.oeopathy_, page 63, there is an observation taken from the Berlin _Med. Zeit._, to the effect that Dr. Lange found the greatest benefit from "a decoction of the whole plant in cases of pa.s.sive haemorrhage generally, and especially in too frequent and too copious menstruation." In the _Zeitsch. f.

Erfahrungsheild._, the periodical published by the followers of Rademacher, Dr. Kinil relates the case of a woman who, three weeks after accouchement, was affected with strangury. She could not retain her urine, which dribbled away, drop by drop, with constant pain in the urethra. The urine was turbid and had a deep red sediment. She got 30 drops of the _tincture of Thlaspi_ five times a day. The strangury disappeared at once, the urine could be retained after a few days, and after eight days it became clear and without sediment.

Dr. Hannon (_Presse Med. Belge_, 1853) mentions that he had found _Thlaspi_ very useful in haemorrhage when the blood was poor in fibrine.

Dr. Heer (Berlin _Med. Zeit._, 1857) found _Thlaspi_ efficacious in the dysuria of old persons, when the pa.s.sage of the urine is painful and there is at the same time spasmodic retention of it. On giving the medicine, a large quant.i.ty of white or red sand is discharged, and the troublesome symptoms disappear. Dr. Joussett (_Bull. de la Soc. Hom. de France_, 1866) had a case of haemorrhage, after miscarriage, at three months. He tried _Sabina_, _Secale_, _Crocus_, tampons soaked in chloride of iron, but all in vain. He consulted Dr. Tessier, who recommended him to try _Thlaspi_, 20 drops of the mother tincture in a draught; at the second spoonful the haemorrhage ceased. He found it useful in haemorrhage with severe uterine colic, with clots of blood, in that following miscarriage, in the metrorrhagias at the menopause, and in those a.s.sociated with cancer of the neck of the uterus. He found good effects from the dilutions in some of these cases. Dr. Jousset, in his _Elements de Med. Prat._, repeats his recommendation of _Thlaspi_ in haemorrhages.

My own experience of _Thlaspi_ is very small. In one case Dr.

Rafinesque, of Paris, cleverly "wiped my eye," to use a sporting term, with this medicine. A young French widow was treated by me for a severe attack of jaundice, from which she made a good recovery. But after this she suffered for a couple of months from a very peculiar discharge after the catamenial flux. It had the appearance of brownish, grumous blood, and was attended with obscure abdominal pains. The cervix uteri was swollen and soft, but not ulcerated. I tried and tried to stop this discharge, but without success. She went back to Paris and put herself under the care of Dr. Rafinesque, who was her ordinary medical attendant. He tried several different medicines without any effect on the discharge. At last he gave _Thlaspi_, 6th dilution, and this had an immediate good effect. Afterwards he gave the mother tincture, 10 drops in 200 grms. of water, by spoonfuls, and again in the 6th dilution, and after keeping her on this medicine for some weeks the discharge was completely cured. The full details of the case will be found in the _Brit. Journ. of Hom._, vol. 32, p. 370.

One other case I have had ill.u.s.trative of its action in the presence of excessive quant.i.ties of uric acid in the urine: A lady, aet 76, was under my care for a very curious affection. She had considerable rheumatic muscular pains in various parts, and constant profuse perspirations day and night. Along with this she had the most abundant secretion of uric acid, which pa.s.sed away with every discharge of urine. Sometimes the uric acid formed small calculi, which gave much pain in their pa.s.sage down the ureter, but it generally appeared in the form of coa.r.s.e sand, which formed a thick layer at the bottom of the utensil. This sand continued to pa.s.s after the cessation of the sweats and rheumatic pains, which lasted six or seven weeks. I tried various remedies--_Pulsatilla_, _Picric acid_, _Lycopodium_, etc., but without effect. At last I bethought me of Rademacher's recommendation of _Thlaspi_, and after a few doses of the 1st dilution the sand diminished very much, and, indeed, sometimes disappeared altogether, and when it did return, it was in insignificant quant.i.ty.

On the whole, I think this medicine deserves a thorough and complete proving. It is evidently a powerful anti-haemorrhagic, and its influence on the urinary organs, more particularly in bringing away and in curing excess of uric acid in the urine, is very remarkable.

I have elsewhere mentioned the power of this substance to affect the secretion of uric acid, and then I have seen several cases corroborative of its medicinal virtues in this direction. One, a gentleman, aet. 57, who, in addition to other dyspeptic symptoms, had occasionally large discharges of coa.r.s.e uric acid, coming away in ma.s.ses the size of a good big pin's head, but curiously enough without pain. I prescribed _Thlaspi_, which he said soon stopped the uric acid. Nearly a year after this he called on me for a different affection, and informed me that the uric acid had reappeared several times in his urine, but that a few doses of _Thlaspi_ 1 stopped it, and it never came to the height it attained when I first gave it to him. A lady, nearly eighty years of age, was suffering from the pressure of a calculus in the left ureter, which I knew to be of uric acid, as she had previously pa.s.sed much 'sand.' The urine showed no sand, and was very scanty. I tried several remedies, among the rest the Borocitrate of magnesia, but it was not till I gave _Thlaspi_ 1 that a great discharge of coa.r.s.e brick-colored sand took place, with speedy relief to her pain. At the same time, indeed, I made her drink copiously of distilled water, which has a powerfully disintegrating effect on uric acid sometimes, but, as she had already been taking this for several days without effect, I am inclined to give the whole credit of the cure to _Thlaspi_.

It is not alone in such cases that _Thlaspi_ is useful. Its ancient use as a haemostatic has been confirmed in modern times and in my own experience, and my friend, Dr. Harper, related to me lately a most interesting cure he had effected by its means of a very prolonged and serious affection. The case was that of an elderly lady who for years had suffered from a large discharge of muco-pus, sometimes mixed with blood, sometimes apparently nearly all blood, which poured from the bowels after each evacuation. She had been many months under the medical treatment of the late Dr. D. Wilson, who at last told her he considered her disease incurable. She then put herself under the treatment of a pract.i.tioner who relies chiefly on oxygen gas for his cures; but she was no better--rather worse--after his treatment. She then came to Dr.

Harper, who worked away at her with all the ordinary remedies without doing a bit of good. At last he bethought him of _Thlaspi_, led thereto by my remarks on its anti-haemorrhagic properties in my "therapeutic notes" in _The Monthly h.o.m.oeopathic Review_ of October, 1888, and he found that, from the time she commenced using this remedy, the discharge from the bowels gradually declined and ultimately ceased, and there has been no return of it.

No doubt _Thlaspi_ is a great remedy, and until it is satisfactorily proved, we may employ it with advantage in cases similar to those I have mentioned. But it is to be hoped that some of our colleagues endowed with youth, health and zeal, will ere long favor us with a good proving of it, whereby its curative powers may be precisionized. At present we only partially know these from the less satisfactory results of clinical experience.

(The following is from a paper by Dr. Millie J. Chapman in Transactions of American Inst.i.tute of h.o.m.oeopathy, 1897:)

The provings are brief and do not furnish very full indications for its use. However, from them we learn of its effectiveness in expelling acc.u.mulations of sand and uric-acid crystals from the kidneys and bladder, also in controlling hemorrhage from the nose, kidneys, or uterus.

My attention was first called to this remedy in cases of sub-involution following either abortion or labor at full term, where it many a time induced recovery.

I have since witnessed equal success in hemorrhage from uterine fibroid where the flow was controlled, and the growth was greatly reduced in size before the age of the individual would naturally produce these changes. Also uterine hemorrhage, attended with cramps and expulsion of clots, has been relieved by it after curetting had failed.

A member of the Women's Provers' a.s.sociation took five drops of the tincture three times a day for ten days. This was followed by a great increase of urine and a menstrual flow lasting fifteen days. She became alarmed and could not be persuaded to continue the proving.

Another took ten drops, three times a day, for five days, when the quant.i.ty of urine and brick dust deposit were so unusual that her interest in scientific investigation suddenly ceased.

About a year since, there came for treatment a patient who had suffered long from both disease and treatment of the bladder. _Thlaspi_ 2x and later five drop doses of the tincture expelled great quant.i.ties of sand, and was followed by complete relief of the bladder symptoms and the disappearance of rheumatic pains that had been supposed incurable.

Another case of similar bladder irritation and marked evidences of gout was promptly relieved.

_Thlaspi_ also has a reputation in the cure of urethritis.