Alumina alum.

Boger's Synoptic Key — Materia Medica

C. M. Boger · Boger's Synoptic Key — Materia Medica · A Synoptic Key of the Materia Medica, 1915 — the Materia Medica half

Region

SPINAL CORD, lumbar. Abdomen, left. RECTUM. Lower limbs. Mucus membranes. Skin.

Worse

WARMTH; ROOM, bed. Foods: Artificial. Potatoes. Speaking. Dry weather. Early on awaking. Sitting. After menses.

Better

Evening. Open air. Moderate: Exertion. Temperature.

General

Thin, inactive; inclines to lie down. Paretic effects. Talking is exhausting. Exhaustion after menses. DRYNESS; of mucous surfaces, eyes, throat, rectum, etc., or irritability and relaxation. Scanty, thick, acrid discharges (Hyds.). Mucus discharges, profuse: before menses, leucorrhœa runs to feet; expectoration. Induration. Chronicity.

Particulars

Illusions of being larger, numb, smooth, heavy, time passing too slowly, etc. Hasty, but slow of execution, hence mistakes in speaking, writing, etc. Peevish. Depressive mental states. Depressed, on awaking. Timorous; fears his own impulses; the sight of knives; loss of reason, etc. Bad memory. Vertigo, < talking. Violent stitches in brain. Dry, falling hair. Weak eyelids. Double squint; < teething. Inflamed, burning eyes. Hot, red ear. Dusky wrinkled, old look. As of white of egg or a cobweb on face. Teeth feel long; pain extends to other parts (Kali-bi.). Twitching low jaw (Gel.). Uvula hangs down. Throat feels full of sticks or constricted. Craves coarse foods (Calc-c.). Big bellied children. Pains from rectum to ankle. Inactive rectum and bladder; strains to pass a soft stool; hard ones cause severe cutting. Stools of small balls, hard knots or bright clots of blood. Must strain at stool to urinate; slow flow. Tickling in sexual organs; increased desire. Profuse leucorrhœa. Constant, dry, hacking cough; interrupts breathing; with sneezing. Sudden loss of voice. As of a hot iron thrust through lower spine. Heavy lower limbs; staggering. Festination. Locomotor ataxia. Totters, if eyes are closed. Painful soles. Gnawing under nails. Bones feel squeezed. Dry, rough, cracked skin. Itching burning over seat of pain. Intolerable itching from heat of bed. Eczema. Chilliness; > open air. Heat, with itching.

Related

Antidotes: Cad-m. Jaborand. Related: Bry. Plb.

Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica

H. C. Allen · Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica · homeoint.org / Medi-T HTML text; edition not stated by the mirror (first edition 1898, Allen d. 1909)

Keynote

Adapted to persons who suffer from chronic diseases; "the Aconite of chronic diseases.". Constitutions deficient in animal heat (Cal., Sil.). Spare, dry, thin subjects; dark complexion; mild, cheerful disposition; hypochondriacs; dry, tettery, itching eruption, worse in winter (Petr.); intolerable itching of whole body when getting warm in bed (Sulph.); scratches until bleeds, then becomes painful. Time passes too slowly; an hour seems half a day (Can. Ind.). Inability to walk, except with the eyes open, and in the daytime; tottering and falling when closing eyes (Arg. n., Gels.). Abnormal appetite; craving for starch, chalk, charcoal, cloves, coffee or tea grounds, acids and indigestible things (Cic., Psor.); potatoes disagree. Chronic eructations for years; worse in evening. All irritating things - salt, wine, vinegar, pepper - immediately produce cough. Constipation: no desire for and no ability to pass stool until there is a large accumulation (Melil.); great straining, must grasp the seat of closet tightly; stool hard, knotty, like laurel berries, covered with mucus; of soft, clayey, adhering to parts (Plat.). Inactivity of rectum, even soft stool requires great straining (Anac., Plat., Sil., Ver.). Constipation: of nursing children, from artificial food; bottle-fed babies; of old people (Lyc., Op.); of pregnancy, from inactive rectum (Sep.). Diarrhoea when she urinates. Has to strain at stool in order to urinate. Leucorrhoea: acrid and profuse, running down to the heels (Syph.); worse during the daytime; > by cold bathing. After menses: exhausted physically and mentally, scarcely able to speak (Carbo an., Coc.). Talking fatigues; faint and tired, must sit down.

Relations

Complementary: to Bryonia. Follows: Bry., Lach., Sulph. Alumina is the chronic of Bryonia. Similar: to Bar. c., Con., in ailments of old people.

Aggravation

In cold air; during winter; while sitting; from eating potatoes; after eating soups; on alternate days; at new and full moon.

Amelioration

Mild summer weather; form warm drinks; while eating (Psor.); in wet weather (Caust.). Alumina is one of the chief antidotes for lead poisoning; painter's colic; ailments from lead.

Key-Notes to the Materia Medica

Henry N. Guernsey · Key-Notes to the Materia Medica · homeoint.org / Médi-T HTML text (Guernsey d. 1885; public domain)

General

Peculiarities about the rectum and stool afford hints to the use of this remedy. For instance, when there is inactivity of the rectum, requiring great straining to evacuate even a soft stool. No desire to stool for days, sometimes a week, until there is a large accumulation, and then evacuation seems only after great effort. Even if the accumulated stool be very soft, the same effort is required to pass it. One must strain at stool in order to urinate. We see this in dysentery, typhus, and in many other disorders, when Alumina will be very likely the remedy.

Mental

Confusion of intellect, loss of memory, time passes too slowly. Seeing knives or scissors she is seized with desire for suicide. Sad thoughts constantly crowd upon the mind; everything is viewed in a sad light. Very changeable mood the same day, alternating from vivacity to thoughtfulness, full of assurance, great timidity. Fears of losing the reason. All mental symptoms worse on waking in the morning. Has a sensation as if he would fall forwards, which he greatly fears.

Head

Vertigo on opening the eyes; everything turns with him in a circle; with white stars. Headache with constipation, vertex is painful to touch. Nape of the neck and head ache on going to bed, cease in the morning on rising. Semi-lateral affections of the head; old rheumatic affections always on same side.

Eyes

The eyes are agglutinated on waking in the morning, and burn on being opened, with dread of light. Dimsightedness, which obliges her to wipe her eyes constantly, to sec better. Eyes inflamed, itching at the inner canthus, agglutination at night, and lachrymation by day; yellow halo around the candle. Eyelids thickened, dry, burning, granular lids. The left upper eyelid hangs down as if paralyzed. Dryness and burning of the eyes and lids, dry mucus in the lids and eyes.

Ears

Affections of the external ears. Stitches in the ears at night, purulent otorrhœa. Heat and redness of the ear for many evenings, roaring in the ears in the evening.

Nose

The septum of the nose is swollen, red, and painful to the touch. Swelling and hardness of the left ala of the nose. Soreness with scabs in the right nostril, with a discharge of much thick, yellow mucus, or pus. Impaired sense of smell. Scurfy, sore nostrils, with discharge of thick, yellow, or yellow-green mucus. Acrid nasal secretions. Ozena, with violent pain in root of the nose. Red nose; point cracked.

Face

The skin of the face feels tense, as if the white of an egg or glue had dried upon it. Involuntary chattering of the lower jaw, with hæmorrhage of the bowels, dark offensive stools.

Mouth

Toothache, extending to other parts, down the larynx; down the neck and shoulders. Taste insipid, tongue coated with a thin, slimy fur. Increased saliva and mucus, although the mouth may feel dry.

Throat

Inflammatory redness in the back part of throat, with thick, viscid mucus. Thick, viscid mucus, from the posterior nares. It is difficult to detach and spit out either of the above. After clearing the throat with so much difficulty, it feels very sore. Stitch in the throat, shooting here and there, on swallowing, and something pointed seems to stick in the throat in the evening. Sensation of constriction, with violent pain, as if a portion of the œsophagus were contracted, sometimes during deglutition, and sometimes not, when swallowing. Can swallow but small morsels at a time. Painful ulcers in the fauces, secreting a brown, badly-smelling pus. Painful deglutition, better after warm drinks. Sensation as of a splinter in the throat.

Stomach

No appetite, sour eructations, heartburn, food no taste. Appetite for starch, chalk, slate, white rags, charcoal, cloves, acids, coffee or tea-grounds, dry rice, and other indigestible things. Worse from eating potatoes and all irritating things, likewise salt, vinegar, pepper, etc., which produce a cough. Constriction and twisting in the stomach, extending up the œsophagus to the throat. Aversion to meat.

Abdomen

Sticking, pressive pain in the region of the abdominal rings, as if a hernia would protrude there. Left side of the abdomen most frequently affected, Painters' colic.

Rectum and Stool

Inactivity of the rectum requiring great straining to evacuate even a soft, small stool. No desire to stool for days, until there is a large accumulation, and then great effort is necessary to evacuate. One must strain at stool in order to urinate. Itching and burning at the anus; often feels as if excoriated and very sore after an evacuation. Dropping of blood during an evacuation, and often a stream of blood follows, leaving a soreness; typhus fever. Firm, hard, scanty stools, with pain in the anus and difficulty of evacuation. Hard, knotty stools, covered with mucus. Small stools, sometimes like pipestems (also Phosphor). Moist, hæmorrhoidal protrusion, with lancinating pain. Cannot urinate without passing stool Diarrhœa with scanty stools, with urging in the rectum, blood frequently, passing, often leaving a sore, raw feeling. Green stools in summer complaints.

Urine

Feeling of weakness in the bladder and genital organs. Fears he will wet the bed. Urine voided when straining at stool. Smarting, corroding urine, with a thick, white sediment.

Sexual

Male: Involuntary seminal emissions, arousing all his old symptoms. Discharge of prostatic fluid during a difficult stool. Female: Prolapsus uteri, ulcerated os. Very abundant acrid leucorrhœa, excoriating all the adjacent parts, sometimes running down the limbs, making walking difficult, relieved by cold water. Leucorrhœa before and after the menses. Menses too soon, too short, scanty, pale, and painful. After the menses great mental and bodily exhaustion. Throbbing, itching, and stitches in the vagina. Burning and itching about the generative organs, internally and externally.

Chest

Dry hacking cough, day or night, sometimes with dryness of the throat. Hoarse and hollow voice from spinal affections. Dry cough, early every morning, until a little white mucus is raised. Dry, hacking cough, from elongated uvula; with vomiting; with sneezing. When stooping, a stitching pain runs from the left side of the abdomen to the middle of the chest. Talking or lifting increases the soreness in the chest. Frequent attacks of palpitation of the heart.

Neck and Back

Pain in the back, as if a hot iron were thrust through the lower vertebræ. Violent stitches in the middle of the back. The cervical muscles draw the head back during sleep. Many spinal complaints are cured by this remedy.

Extremities

Upper: Brittle nails and brittle skin on fingers. Much pain in shoulders, arms, and fingers. Lower: Great heaviness in lower limbs; when walking, he staggers and has to sit down. When sitting, the nates go to sleep. In the thighs and legs, long continued tension, like a cramp, extending downwards. Trembling of the knees. Frequent cramps in the calves. Numbness of the heel on stepping upon the foot. Soles of the feet too sore to step upon. Faint and tired, must sit down. Many troubles from spinal affections.

Sleep

Restless sleep, always awakening with palpitation of the heart. Tired and drowsy. Confused, anxious dreams; dreams about thieves.

Skin

Intolerable itching of the whole body, especially when becoming heated from any cause, even in bed; has to scratch until the skin bleeds. Chapped skin. Boils or itching exanthemata on perineum. Brittle nails.

Generalities

Sensation of throbbings, and pulsations in inner parts. Great and tremulous lassitude of the whole body. Spasms, with laughing and talking between the paroxysms. Very marked fatigue on talking. So excessively faint and tired, must lie or sit down. Patient improves for a time, then relapses.

Worse

On alternate days, in the afternoon, in a warm room. From eating potatoes.

Better

In the open air.

Remedy following

Bryon.

Antidotes

Bryon., Chamom., Ipec.

Seven Hundred Red Line Symptoms from Materia Medica

J. W. Hutchison · Seven Hundred Red Line Symptoms from Materia Medica · rewritten from Hering's and other materia medicas

Red line symptom

Inactivity of the rectum, oven soft stool requires great straining. No desire for and no ability to pass stool, until there is a large accumulation. Profuse, transparent, acrid leucorrhoea running down to the feet during the day.

Homœopathic Materia Medica

William Boericke · Homœopathic Materia Medica · 9th edition

Common name

Oxide et Aluminum-Argilla

General

A very general condition corresponding to this drug is dryness of mucous membranes and skin, and tendency to paretic muscular states. Old people, with lack of vital heat, or prematurely old, with debility. Sluggish functions, heaviness, numbness, and staggering, and the characteristic constipation find an excellent remedy in Alumina. Disposition to colds in the head, and eructations in spare, dry, thin subjects. Delicate children, products of artificial baby foods.

Mind

Low-spirited; fears loss of reason. Confused as to personal identity. Hasty, hurried. Time passes slowly. Variable mood. Better as day advances. Suicidal tendency when seeing knife or blood.

Head

Stitching, burning pain in head, with vertigo, worse in morning, but relieved by food. Pressure in forehead as from a tight hat. Inability to walk except with eyes open. Throbbing headache, with constipation. Vertigo, with nausea; better after breakfast. Falling out of hair; scalp itches and is numb.

Eyes

Objects look yellow. Eyes feel cold. Lids dry, burn, smart, thickened, aggravated in morning; chronic conjunctivitis. Ptosis. Strabismus.

Ears

Humming; roaring. Eustachian tube feels plugged.

Nose

Pain at root of nose. Sense of smell diminished. Fluent coryza. Point of nose cracked, nostrils sore, red; worse touch. Scabs with thick yellow mucus. Tettery redness. Ozœna atrophica sicca. Membranes distended and boggy.

Face

Feels as if albuminous substance had dried on it. Blood-boils and pimples. Twitching of lower jaw. Rush of blood to face after eating.

Mouth

Sore. Bad odor from it. Teeth covered with sordes. Gums sore, bleeding. Tensive pain in articulation of jaw when opening mouth or chewing.

Throat

Dry, sore; food cannot pass, œsophagus contracted. Feels as if splinter or plug were in throat. Irritable, and relaxed throat. Looks parched and glazed. Clergyman's sore throat in thin subjects. Thick, tenacious mucus drops from posterior nares. Constant inclination to clear the throat.

Stomach

Abnormal cravings-chalk, charcoal, dry food, tea-grounds. Heartburn; feels constricted. Aversion to meat (Graph; Arn; Puls). Potatoes disagree. No desire to eat. Can swallow but small morsels at a time. Constriction of œsophagus.

Abdomen

Colic, like painter's colic. Pressing in both groins toward sexual organs. Left-sided abdominal complaints.

Stool

Hard dry, knotty; no desire. Rectum sore, dry, inflamed, bleeding. Itching and burning at anus. Even a soft stool is passed with difficulty. Great straining. Constipation of infants (Collins; Psor; Paraf) and old people from inactive rectum, and in women of very sedentary habit. Diarrhœa on urinating. Evacuation preceded by painful urging long before stool, and then straining at stool.

Urine

Muscles of bladder paretic, must strain at stool in order to urinate. Pain in kidneys, with mental confusion. Frequent desire to urinate in old people. Difficult starting.

Male

Excessive desire. Involuntary emissions when straining at stool. Prostatic discharge.

Female

Menses too early, short, scanty, pale, followed by great exhaustion (Carb an; Coccul). Leucorrhœa acrid, profuse transparent, ropy, with burning; worse during daytime, and after menses. Relieved by washing with cold water.

Respiratory

Cough soon after waking in the morning. Hoarse, aphonia, tickling in larynx; wheezing, rattling respiration. Cough on talking or singing, in the morning. Chest feels constricted. Condiments produce cough. Talking aggravates soreness of chest.

Back

Stitches. Gnawing pain, as if from hot iron. Pain along cord, with paralytic weakness.

Extremities

Pain in arm and fingers, as if hot iron penetrated. Arms feel paralyzed. Legs feel asleep, especially when sitting with legs crossed. Staggers on walking. Heels feel numb. Soles tender; on stepping, feel soft and swollen. Pain in shoulder and upper arm. Gnawing beneath finger nails. Brittle nails. Inability to walk, except when eyes are open or in daytime. Spinal degenerations and paralysis of lower limbs.

Sleep

Restless; anxious and confused dreams. Sleepy in morning.

Skin

Chapped and dry tettery. Brittle nails. Intolerable itching when getting warm in bed. Must scratch until it bleeds; then becomes painful. Brittle skin on fingers.

Modalities

Worse, periodically; in afternoon; from potatoes. Worse, in morning on awaking; warm room. Better, in open air; from cold washing; in evening and on alternate days. Better damp weather.

Relationship

Compare: Aluminum chloridum (Pains of loco-motor ataxia. Lower trits in water). Slag Silico-Sulphocalcite of Alumina 3x (anal itching, piles, constipation, flatulent distention); Secale; Lathyr; Plumb. Aluminum acetate solution. Externally a lotion for putrid wounds and skin infections. Arrests hæmorrhage from inertia of uterus. Parenchymatous hæmorrhage from various organs-23 % solution. Hæmorrhage following tonsillectomy is controlled by rinsing out nasopharynx with a 10 % sol.

Complementary: Bryonia.

Antidotes: Ipecac; Chamom.

Dose

Sixth to thirtieth and higher. Action slow in developing.

Leaders in Homoeopathic Therapeutics

E. B. Nash · Leaders in Homoeopathic Therapeutics · homeoint.org / Médi-T HTML text (Nash d. 1917; public domain)

Leaders

Inactivity of the rectum; even the soft stool requires great straining.

Anæmia in women, who are hungry for starch, chalk, rags, charcoal, cloves and other ridiculous unnatural; things; potatoes disagree, profuse leucorrhœa.

Great heaviness in lower limbs, weak, has to sit down; numbness of heels; sense of hot iron thrust through back.

The chief characteristic leading to the use or this remedy is found in its peculiar constipation. "Inactivity of the rectum, even the soft stool requires great straining." Like Bryonia, there is no desire for stool and the constipation seems to depend upon dryness of the mucous follicles. Again it is adapted to dry, spare subjects. There are other points of resemblance between these two remedies and they complement each other well. There are both excellent in infantile constipation, which is often a very obstinate affection to treat. Anacardium, Sepia, Silicea and Veratrum album are nearest of kin in this lack of expulsive power in the rectum.

Alumina is one of our remedies in chlorotic conditions. The patient is pale, weak, tired, must sit down to rest. The menses are scanty, delayed, and are pale colored when they come, and after the menses the patient is exhausted and pale. (Carbo an. and Cocculus.) Then, again, there is profuse leucorrhœa sometimes running down to the heels if she does not wear a cloth. (Syphilinum.) It is as profuse as the menses ought to be. These anæmic patients are often hungry for starch, chalk, rags, charcoal, cloves and other ridiculous and unnatural things. Alumina is a great remedy in such cases. The Natrum mur. chlorotic couldn't eat bread, or had an aversion to it. The Alumina patient can't eat potatoes; they disagree. Pulsatilla can't eat fat food, pastries, etc. Alumina resembles Pulsatilla in chronic nasal catarrhs, and both are of tearful temperament, but the constitutions are different. Alumina being dry and thin, Pulsatilla phlegmatic. One thing I forgot to mention under stool and rectum, viz., Alumina is one of the best remedies for hæmorrhages of the bowels in typhoid fever. The blood comes in large clots looking solid like liver. This remedy is also very efficacious in chronic sore throats, like clergyman's sore throat. There is "soreness, rawness, hoarseness and dryness." This dryness excites a continual disposition to hawk, and after a long time the patient raises a little thick, tough phlegm. This kind of throat is temporarily relieved by warm food and drinks. The remedy nearest to this is Argentum nitricum, but in Argentum there are wart-like excrescences or granulations in the throat. Both remedies have a sensation of a splinter in the throat, as do also Hepar sulphuricum, Dolichos and Nitric acid.

Alumina has also a sensation of constriction in the throat and œsophagus. It hurts to swallow. Alumina is recommended for the following symptoms, which often appear in locomotor ataxia: "Great heaviness in the lower limbs; can scarcely drag them; while walking staggers and has to sit down; in the evening." "Inability to walk except with the eyes open and in the day time." Numbness of the heel when stepping." "Excessively faint and tired, must sit down." "Pain in the back as if a hot iron were thrust through the vertebræ." I give these on the authority of others, for I have never verified them. I will add here the value of Alumen.

Text Book of Materia Medica

Adolph Lippe · Text Book of Materia Medica · homeoint.org / Médi-T HTML text (Lippe d. 1888; public domain)

Mind and Disposition

Easily offended. Disposition to shed tears. Anxious and full of fears. Alternate vivacity and thoughtfulness. Great weakness of memory and inability to think coherently.

Head

Reeling vertigo, as if he would fall over, with a faint feeling or nausea early in the morning, disappearing after breakfast. Vertigo, with white stars before the eyes. Pressing headache in the forehead, over the eyes, with congestion of blood to the eyes and nose, with a chill when walking in the open air ; better after lying or eating. Pulsations in the head (vertex) with congestions to the eyes and nose. Stitches in the brain, with nausea. The headache is worse in the evening and when walking in the open air ; better after lying down and after eating.

Eyes

Stitches in the eyes. Sensation of coldness in the eyes and eyelids. Swelling of the eyelids. Inclination to stare. Squinting. Spasmodic contraction of the eyelids at night, with violent pain on opening the eyes. Dim-sightedness, as from a mist, compelling him to rub the eyes. The eyes water during the day, agglutination at night.

Ears

Stitches in the (left) ear (evening). One ear hot and red (in the evening).

Nose

Soreness and scabs in the nose, with discharge of thick low mucus. Swelling and redness. Frequent attacks of coryza. Ozæna.

Face

Tension on the face, as if the white of an egg had dried on the skin. Bulbous swellings and blood-boils on the face and nose.

Mouth

Sensation of soreness in the mouth when eating.

Throat

Sensation of constriction in the œsophagus when swallowing. Sensation, as if the œsophagus were contracted when swallowing a small morsel of food ; -it is felt until it enters into the stomach. Great dryness of the throat. The pains in the throat are worse in the evening and at night, and are relieved by warm food and drinks.

Stomach

Sour eructations. Nausea, with faintness. Constriction of the Stomach, extending to the œsophagus.

Abdomen

Painter's colic.

Stool and Anus

Difficult evacuations from want of peristaltic motion of the intestines ; even the soft stool can only be passed by great pressing. Constipation of pregnant women, children and painters. Diarrhœa with tenesmus. Discharges of dark blood when walking, or in typhus fever, or with a hard stool. Humidity of hæmorrhoidal tumors. Itching at the anus.

Urinary Organs

Frequent ineffectual desire to urinate : the urine can only be passed during a stool. Increased secretion and frequent discharge of pale, water-colored urine.

Sexual Organs

Women. Menstruation too early, too short and too scanty ; blood pale. Before and during menstruation, pain in the abdomen. Fluor albus acrid, excoriating, transparent mucus before and after menstruation.

Larynx and trachea

Dry, short cough, especially in the morning, with dyspnœa. Cough, with expectoration, in the morning. Hoarseness, especially in the afternoon and evening.

Chest

Pressing pain in the chest, at night. Constriction in the chest, when stooping.

Back

Pain in the back, as if a hot iron were thrust through the lower vertebræ. Stitches in the back.

Upper Extremities

Paralytic lameness of the arms. Pain in the arm, down to the fingers, as if a hot iron were thrust through it. Rhagades on the hands.

Lower Extremities

The legs feel numb, as if asleep, especially at night.

Generalities

Great debility and weakness, especially when talking (a short walk fatigues him much). Spasms, with attacks of laughing and weeping. Involuntary motions (jerks of the head and other parts). Unpleasant want of animal heat. Illusive sensations ; some parts of the body feel as if they had become larger. While sitting, frequent stretching of the limbs (as from drowsiness). Sensation constriction in internal organs (œsophagus, stomach, rectum, bladder). Great heaviness in the legs and arms.

Fever

Pulse full and accelerated. Chill, generally in the evening, in bed, or near the warm stove ; often with heat of the face. During the day, chill ; during the night, fever. Heat in the evening, which spreads from the face ; at times only over the right side of the body. Perspiration at night, or more towards morning, in bed ; mostly in the face, or on one side of the face. Inability to perspire.

Skin

Tetters itching in the evening. Humid scabs. Rhagades. Brittle nails. Chapped skin and bulbous eruptions.

Conditions

Aggravation, on alternate days. The skin symptoms at each full and new moon ; periodically ; in the afternoon ; while sitting in a room ; while urinating ; from eating potatoes. Amelioration, daring moderate exercise ; in the open air ; on alternate days.

A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica

John Henry Clarke · A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica · 1st edition (1900-02, three volumes); homeoint.org / Médi-T HTML digitization

General

Argilla. Oxide of Aluminium. Pure Clay. AL 2 O 3 3 H 2 O. Trituration.

Clinical

Anus, affections of . Boils. Bubo. Catarrh. Chlorosis. Constipation . Constipation of nursing infants. Cough . Disappointments, effects of. Dysentery. Dyspepsia. Eczema. Eyes, affections of. Fissures. Fistula. Headache. Hernia. Irritation. Leucorrhœa. Locomotor ataxy. Nails, affections of . Otorrhœa. Ozæna. Paralysis. Pregnancy, constipation of. Pregnancy, toothache of. Prostatorrhœa. Rhagades. Scrofula. Strabismus. Taste, disordered. Tetters, moist and itching. Throat, affections of. Trismus. Typhus.

Characteristics

Like its relative Alumen, Alumina produces irritation of mucous membranes with dryness or extreme secretion and paralysis of involuntary muscles, as those of the rectum and of the nervous and muscular systems generally. Alumina paralyses the bowels in the same way as lead, to which it is an antidote. Even small and soft stools are passed with great difficulty. Pregnant women and children are liable to this kind of constipation. A very prominent characteristic is that a person must strain at stool in order to urinate . Teste groups Alumina with Sepia and Copaiva . He considers it the chronic of Sepia as Silic . is of Puls . Paralysis of the internal rectus muscle of the eye, causing squint. Also ptosis. Drawing, pains appear in the limbs; a sensation of constriction in several organs. Several painful symptoms show themselves after the midday meal, and continue till evening, when they disappear or are replaced by others which begin only then. On the other hand the pains which appear in the morning or in the evening are abated after eating. Trembling, convulsive movements of the limbs and head; spasms, with tears and laughter alternately. There is exaltation of the whole nervous system. Trembling of the whole body with desire to lie down, which, however, < the fatigue. Great general fatigue, even after a short walk, but chiefly after speaking. Frequent stretching while sitting. The nates go to sleep while sitting. Drags legs (especially left). Many of the symptoms of locomotor ataxy are reproduced by Alumina , and it is one of the most useful remedies in that disease. Bœnninghausen cured a case with Aluminium . Sluggishness of action is characteristic of this medicine; urine is slow in passing; great straining to pass even a soft stool; can only evacuate bowels when standing; has to strain as if abdomen and rectum were paralysed. ( Caust . has defecation only when standing; but the straining is less.) Sensations are slow in being transmitted to the centres. In the mental sphere there is confusion. "When he says anything he feels as if another person had said it, and when he sees anything, as if another person had seen it, or as if he could transfer himself into another, and only then could see." A feeling of hurry follows, things do not move fast enough. Impulses. Suicidal tendency, a sudden impulse from seeing blood on a knife. Sad; apprehensive; wants to getaway; fears going crazy. Mental symptoms mostly come on in the morning on waking. Vertigo on closing eyes. Catarrh is a very general feature. Catarrh with dryness of mucous membranes. The throat looks parched and glazed. The nose is stopped, feels dry, and the point of it is cracked. Alm . has the fish-bone sensation in the throat on swallowing. There is profuse leucorrhœa running down to the heels, sometimes excoriating. As with the mucous membrane so with the skin: itching eruptions < from warmth of bed. Eruptions of all kinds, indurations, ulcers. Granular eyelids. Hairs fall out all over body. The skin of the face feels as if covered with dried white of egg, or as if a cobweb was on it. Fissures. Alumina has some curious symptoms in the digestive sphere. There is a craving for dry rice and dry food. It has < from starch, especially the starch of potatoes. < From salt, wine, vinegar, spirits. Burning pains in the back are very characteristic, and especially a sensation as if a hot iron were forced through the lower vertebræ.

There are pulsations in various parts. The pains go upward. Upper left; lower right affected (opposite of Lyc.).

The symptoms are < on alternate days; periodically. Guernsey describes a characteristic periodicity thus: "Patient gets along nicely for a time, then, from no apparent cause, gets worse for a time, then better, and soon a relapse may be worse than the original illness, another relapse not so bad, and so on with longer intervals between." In afternoons; at new or full moon; < in the morning on waking. < After coitus. < In cold air, out of doors; in dry weather. They are > by cold washing; by moistening the part; by warm food or drink; by warmth generally.

Alumina is suited to persons of sedentary habits who suffer from chronic ailments; to constitutions with diminished animal heat. Psoric persons. The action of Alumina is slow in developing, and the remedy must not be changed quickly.

Relations

Compare: Aluminium (which has been used on indications taken from the proving of Alumina). Antidote to: Lead. Antidoted by: Bry., Camph., Cham., Ipec. Complementary: Bry. Follows well: Bry., Lach., Sul. Similar to: Alumen; Arg. nit. (clergyman's sore throat, paralysis); Bar. c. (hypochondriasis of aged; constipation); Bry., Calc.; Cham. (useful as an intermediate remedy); Con. (old people; squint) Ferrum (chlorosis; relaxed abdomen; disgust for meat, &c.) Fer. iod. (profuse transparent leucorrhœa); Graphit. (chlorosis, skin rough, chapped, itching nails; blepharitis, &c.); Ipec.; Kali bi. (clergyman's sore throat) Lach. (sad on waking; climaxis); Lyc. (clergyman's sore throat) Pic. ac., Plumb. (colic, constipation) Puls. (tearful, peevish; head, &c., > in open air; ozæna; taste lost averse to meat; scanty menses complaints at puberty; lack of animal heat; soles of feet sore, < walking; toes red, itching, &c.); Ruta (loss of power of internal recti); Sepia (irritable, tearful; ozæna; scanty menses; puberty prolapsus uteri; inactive rectum weakness in urinary organs, &c.); Sil., Sul., Zinc. (inner canthus granular lids; < from wine).

Causation

Anger. Disappointments. Lifting. Bodily exertion.

Mind

Humour morose, sad, with despair of cure. ─ Involuntary tears. ─ Anguish and anxiety as if one were threatened with some fatal accident, or had committed some crime. ─ Time passes too slowly; intolerable ennui; an hour seems half a day. ─ Seeing blood on a knife she has horrid ideas of killing herself, though she abhors the idea. ─ Apprehensions. ─ Disposition to be frightened. ─ Air sorrowful and morose. ─ Ill-humour, with unfitness for labour. ─ Disposition to be angry. ─ Obstinate, and contradictory humour. ─ Taking everything in bad part. ─ Humour changeable; at one time bold, at another timid. ─ Weakness of memory. ─ Distraction, inadvertence, and incapability of following up an idea. ─ Absence of ideas. ─ Blunders in speaking. ─ Great vivacity of apprehension, alternately with inadvertence, and deprivation of sight and hearing. ─ Sensation, as if self-consciousness were outside the body.

Head

Dizziness, whirling sensation, everything turns in a circle, most frequently so as to cause falling; sometimes with nausea, or tension in the nape of the neck; < before breakfast; on opening eyes; when closing eyes. ─ Easily made drunk. ─ Vertigo, with white stars before the eyes. ─ State of intoxication after smoking tobacco, or after having taken the weakest spirituous drink, and principally in the morning. ─ Headache, as if one were dragged by the hair; or smart shootings in the brain, with inclination to vomit. ─ Stitches in the brain with nausea. ─ Heaviness of the head, with paleness of face, and fatigue. ─ Compressive cephalalgia. ─ Headache with constipation. ─ Headache from chronic catarrhs in the head. ─ Beatings and pulsations in the head. ─ Congestion of blood towards the eyes and nose, with pressure in the forehead and epistaxis, with a chill when walking in the open air; better after lying or eating. ─ Headache < while walking in the open air; > lying down, the head being softly supported. ─ Itching in the forehead. ─ Pain, as from excoriation, in the scalp. ─ (Moist crusts on the temples.). ─ Dryness of the hair. ─ Itching in the scalp, with profuse desquamation.

Eyes

Pressure on the eyes, which renders it impossible to open them. ─ Pressure, as from a grain of sand, in the corner of the eye, in the evening. ─ Sensation of burning in the eyes, with nocturnal agglutination of the lids, and diurnal lachrymation. ─ Sensation of coldness in the eyes and eyelids on walking in open air. ─ Swelling of the eyelids. ─ Paralysis of the upper lid. ─ Hordeolum. ─ Eyelashes fall out. ─ Inclination to stare. ─ Spasmodic drawing of the lids at night, with pain in the eyes on opening them. ─ Stitches in the eyes. ─ Photophobia. ─ Confusion of sight, as from a mist, and sparkling before the eyes. ─ Yellow aspect of all objects. ─ Coloured reflection round the candle in the evening. ─ Strabismus of both eyes; esp. loss of power of internal rectus. ─ Glittering before the eyes on shutting them. ─ Far sight.

Ears

Shooting pains in the ears, principally in the evening, or at night. ─ Stitches in the (l.) ear (evening). ─ Itching and sensation of burning in the ears. ─ Frequently, in the evening, heat and redness of one ear. ─ Purulent discharge from the ears. ─ Crackling noise and buzzing in the ears, chiefly when chewing, but also on swallowing.

Nose

Pain in the root of the nose and in the forehead. ─ Pain, swelling, and redness of the nose. ─ Soreness and scabs in the nose, with discharge of thick yellow mucus. ─ Discharge of solid, yellow, greenish substances from the nose. ─ Accumulation and flow of a thick and yellowish matter from the nose. ─ Nostrils ulcerated. ─ Furunculus in the nose. ─ Ozæna. ─ Blood from the nose when blown. ─ Epistaxis. ─ Sour smell in the nose. ─ Smell either exceedingly delicate or weak. ─ Coryza, with defluxion from one nostril, with stoppage of the other. ─ Coryza, alternately dry and flowing. ─ Stoppage of the nose.

Face

Aspect gloomy, morose. ─ Rapid alternation of redness and paleness of countenance. ─ Copper-like redness of the cheeks, as in drunkards. ─ Tingling on the face, and tension of the skin, as if it were covered with white of egg dried. ─ Sensation of swelling, and of heaviness of countenance. ─ Bulbous swellings and blood-boils on the face and nose. ─ Red painful spot on the cheek. ─ Roughness of the skin of the face, esp. over the forehead. ─ Heat and redness. ─ Itching and eruption of small pimples over the face. ─ Moist scabs on the temples. ─ Shooting and drawing sensation in the cheek-bones. ─ Transient heat of face. ─ Furunculus in the cheeks. ─ Leprous tubercles in the face. ─ Lips dry, and cracked, with exfoliation of the skin. ─ Swelling of the lips. ─ Pimples and scabby eruptions on the lips. ─ Swelling of the jaws, with tensive pain on opening the mouth, and on chewing. ─ Shortening of the lower jaw. ─ Involuntary spasmodic twitching of lower jaw. ─ Trismus.

Teeth

Pains in the teeth on chewing, or in the evening, in bed. ─ Tearing in the teeth, extending to other parts, as far as the zygomatic bone, and in the forehead and temples. ─ Piercing pain in the carious teeth. ─ Ulceration of the roots of the teeth. ─ Ulcer on the gums. ─ Swelling of the gums, which have a tendency to bleed. ─ Sensation as though the teeth were elongated. ─ Odontalgia, with nervous irritation, as after a chill, or after the use of Chamomilla.

Mouth

Pain as of excoriation in the mouth, palate, tongue, and gums, which almost prevents eating. ─ Small ulcers in the mouth. ─ Dryness of the mouth, chiefly on waking. ─ Accumulation of a sweetish or sour saliva in the mouth, like actual salivation. ─ Musty or putrid smell from the mouth. ─ Tongue loaded with a black or yellowish coating. ─ Expectoration of bloody mucus.

Throat

Sore throat, which is aggravated in the evening and at night, but which is ameliorated on taking anything warm, and which is less painful in the morning. ─ Contractive, or shooting pains in the throat, chiefly on swallowing. ─ Difficult deglutition, as if the gullet were contracted. ─ Cramp-like pressure and squeezing in the œsophagus. ─ Sensation, as if the œsophagus were contracted when swallowing a small morsel of food; it is felt until it enters into the stomach. ─ Pains in throat < evening and night. ─ Swelling of the tonsils. ─ Great dryness in the throat. ─ Accumulation of a thick and viscous mucus in the throat, with difficult expectoration. ─ Painful ulcers in the fauces, secreting a brown, badly-smelling pus. ─ Sensation of a splinter in the throat.

Appetite

Sweetish taste, or a taste of blood in the mouth. ─ Rough taste, astringent, or bitter and insipid. ─ Bulimy. ─ Irregular appetite; at one time too strong, at another too weak. ─ Food appears insipid, esp. in the evening, and principally bread and meat. ─ Distaste for animal food. ─ Craving, with want of appetite. ─ Appetite for dry foods; for starch; chalk; clean white rags; charcoal; cloves; acids; coffee or tea grounds; dry rice. ─ Desire for hot drinks. ─ Desire for vegetables, for fruits, and spoon meats. ─ After having eaten, and chiefly in the evening, hiccough, pressure in the stomach and abdomen, distaste, nausea, and lassitude. ─ Potatoes excite nausea and bitter eructations. ─ All irritating things immediately start cough.

Stomach

Eructations, sour and acrid, and pyrosis. ─ Chronic tendency to eructation. ─ Frequent eructations. ─ Nausea, with faintness. ─ Frequent nausea and inclination to vomit, chiefly when speaking, when re-entering the room after walking, and in the morning. ─ Pressure in the stomach, chiefly in the evening and after eating. ─ Contraction and constriction in the region of the stomach, often as far as the throat and breast, and sometimes with difficult respiration. ─ Pain, as from excoriation, in the pit of the stomach and in the hypochondria, principally on turning the body in bed, or on stooping.

Abdomen

Painful sensibility of the liver on stooping, followed sometimes by shooting pains. ─ Colic whenever the body is exposed to a chill. ─ Colic with drawing pains, principally in the evening, or at night, or after dinner. ─ Cutting pains, chiefly in the morning. ─ Flatulent colic. ─ The colic is ameliorated by heat applied externally. ─ Painter's colic. ─ Protrusion and incarceration of inguinal hernia.

Stool and Anus

Stools hard, unfrequent, and scanty, sometimes with pain in the anus. ─ Constipation and obstruction of the abdomen. ─ Difficult stool, from inactivity of the intestines. ─ Difficult evacuations from want of peristaltic motion of the intestines; even the soft stool can only be passed by great pressing. ─ Constipation of pregnant women, children, and painters. ─ No desire for, and no ability to pass stool, until there is a large accumulation. ─ Hard, knotty stools, covered with mucus. ─ Small stools, sometimes like pipe stems (also Phosphor.). ─ Voiding of much slimy matter with the stool, during the continuance of colic. ─ Loose stools with pain in the belly and tenesmus. ─ Green stools in summer complaints. ─ Loss of blood during and after the stools. ─ Burning and itching in the anus. ─ Blind piles protrude, become moist, with lancinating pain; are hard and itch. ─ Pressure and shooting pain in the perinæum.

Urinary Organs

Pain in the kidneys, principally when walking or stooping. ─ Sensation of weakness in the bladder and in the genital parts. ─ Eager desire to make water, with increased aqueous evacuation, accompanied sometimes by a sensation of burning. ─ Frequent ineffectual desire to urinate: the urine can only be passed during a stool. ─ Urine less copious, with red and sandy sediment. ─ Nocturnal urination. ─ Urine turbid, white, as if chalk had been put into it. ─ Thick whitish sediment in the urine.

Male Sexual Organs

Sexual desire increased; or suppressed. ─ Frequent pollutions and nocturnal erections. ─ Copious secretion behind the glans. ─ Excoriation of the prepuce. ─ Contractive pain in the spermatic cord, with contraction of the testicle. ─ Hardness and painful sensibility in one of the testes. ─ Flowing of prostate fluid during difficult stools. ─ Pains in the perinæum, during coition, and while the erection continues. ─ Increase of suffering after pollution. ─ Sweat on perinæum at beginning of erection or during coition.

Female Sexual Organs

Menstruation scanty, too early, and of short duration; blood pale. ─ Menses too copious, with inflation of the abdomen. ─ During the period of menstruation, sleep agitated, with many dreams, great activity in the circulation, heat in the face, headache, and palpitation of the heart. ─ Before and during menstruation, colics, headaches, and other painful affections. ─ After the menses great fatigue. ─ Corrosive leucorrhœa, with smarting in the genital parts. ─ Leucorrhœa before or after the menses, and often with trembling, fatigue, and colic. ─ Leucorrhœa flesh-coloured, or aqueous, and causing stiffness of the linen; transparent mucus before and after menstruation.

Respiratory Organs

Dry cough, principally in the morning, sometimes, at a later period, followed by expectoration. ─ Short, dry cough. ─ Dry, short cough, esp. in the morning, with dyspnœa. ─ All irritating foods immediately start cough. ─ Cough with impeded respiration, or with pains in the head and at the nape of the neck. ─ Catarrh of the larynx and of the bronchi, with scraping sensation in the throat. ─ Sudden taking cold, with loss of voice, morning and evening.

Chest

Oppression at the chest. ─ Dyspnœa when seated. ─ Nocturnal pressure in the chest. ─ Sensation of constriction in the chest, chiefly when seated in a bending attitude, or while stooping. ─ Pain, as of excoriation, in the chest and in the pit of the stomach, sometimes with cough. ─ Pain in the sternum on touching it.

Heart

Palpitation and shocks at the heart. ─ Palpitation every morning on waking; irregular beats. ─ Wakes 4 to 5 a.m. with anxiety at heart, > immediately after rising.

Neck and Back

Itching of nape of neck and throat. ─ Stitches in nape. ─ Pain in the loins during repose. ─ Pain like that of a bruise in the loins and in the back. ─ Shooting pains in the back. ─ Sensation in the back as if it were pierced with a hot iron; through the lower vertebræ.

Upper Limbs

Pains in the arms while kept hanging down or extended on the bed. ─ Tearing in the arms from the shoulder to the fingers. ─ Pain, as if burned by a hot iron, in the elbows and the fingers. ─ Paralytic weight in the arms. ─ Swelling of the arm and the fingers. ─ Tetters and moist scabs on the forearms. ─ Mealy desquamation of the hands. ─ Fissures in the hands, which readily bleed. ─ Gnawing pain under the nails, sometimes with tingling in the arm. ─ The nails have a tendency to break when they are cut. ─ Panaris.

Lower Limbs

Stiffness, numbness, and insensibility of the legs at night. ─ Sensation of tearing in almost all parts of the lower limbs. ─ Great heaviness and weakness of the legs, chiefly in the hips. ─ When sitting, the nates go to sleep. ─ Drawing pain in the knees when going upstairs. ─ Tension in the calves when walking, and cramps on crossing the legs and on resting the toes on the ground. ─ Pain as from fatigue in the joints of the feet when seated. ─ Pains in the soles of the feet when walking. ─ Cold in the feet. ─ Itching and redness in the toes, as if from chilblains. ─ Sensation of burning under the toes.

Generalities

Pulling pains in the limbs. ─ Sensation of constriction in internal organs (œsophagus, stomach, rectum, bladder). ─ Aggravation of suffering from potatoes, and often on alternate days. ─ Several painful symptoms show themselves after dinner, and continue till evening, when they disappear, or are replaced by others, which begin only then. ─ The pains which appear in the morning, or in the evening, are abated after eating. ─ Suffering in consequence of disappointments. ─ Trembling and convulsive movements of the limbs, and even of the head. ─ Great heaviness in the legs and arms. ─ Spasms, with tears and laughter alternately. ─ Exaltation of the whole nervous system. ─ Illusive sensations; some parts of the body feel as if they had become larger. ─ Trembling of the whole body, with desire to lie down, which, however, increases the fatigue. ─ Great general fatigue, even after a short walk, but principally after speaking. ─ Frequent stretching while sitting. ─ Want of vital heat.

Skin

Miliary eruption in the arms and legs, with much itching and serous bleeding after having scratched. ─ Chapped skin and bulbous eruptions. ─ Boils or itching exanthemata on perinæum. ─ The slightest injuries of the skin smart, and become inflamed. ─ Leprous pimples. ─ Scurf and tetters, which itch or become moist chiefly in the evening. ─ Renewal of cutaneous symptoms at every new or full moon. ─ Rhagades. ─ Brittle nails.

Sleep

Sleep tardy, and wakefulness before midnight. ─ Restless sleep, always awakening with palpitation of the heart. ─ Nocturnal sleep too light, agitated, with frequent starts. ─ Deep sleep, not refreshing, with a desire in the morning to sleep more. ─ Frequent waking in the night. ─ Dreams frequent, anxious, with talking, laughter, tears, lamentations, groans, and somnambulism. ─ Dreams of horses, of quarrels, and of vexations, of fire, of marriages, of spectres, of death, of robbers. ─ Dreams, with fear of death after waking. ─ Nightmare. ─ During the night, anxiety, agitation, and tossing about; or heat, toothache, headache, spasms, and oppression of the chest, or diarrhœa, with pains in the stomach, and shiverings. ─ After sleep, on waking in the morning, mind weighed down by vexatious ideas, or nausea, with insipidity in the stomach, and feverish movements.

Fever

Pulse full and accelerated. ─ Shivering, even when near a fire, and at night, in bed, not able to warm oneself. ─ Fever towards the evening, with predominant chilliness. ─ Sensation of cold immediately after taking soup at midday. ─ During the day chill; during the night, fever. ─ Heat in the evening which spreads from the face; at times only over the r. side of the body. ─ Perspiration at night, or more towards morning, in bed; mostly in the face, or on one side of the face. ─ Inability to perspire.

The Guiding Symptoms of Our Materia Medica

Constantine Hering · The Guiding Symptoms of Our Materia Medica · 1879–91

Mind

Consciousness not clear.
Consciousness of his personal identity confused. θ Paralysis.
Great weakness or loss of memory.
Inability to recollect things or follow up a train of thought. θ Cephalalgia.
Confusion and obscuration of intellect ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Makes mistakes in speaking, using words not intended.
Time passes too slowly ; intolerable ennui ; an hour seems half a day.
Difficulty of thinking.
Mania to kill himself with a sharp weapon.
Seeing blood on a knife, she has horrid ideas of killing herself, though she abhors the idea.
Crying, against his will.
No desire to do anything, especially anything serious. θ Cephalalgia.
Depressed and lachrymose. θ Melancholia.
Fearfulness.
Sad thoughts in morning, joyless and comfortless on awaking.
Low-spirited, trifling things appeared insurmountable. θ Liver complaint.
Apprehensiveness.
Apprehensive of losing his reason.
Uneasy evenings, as from impending evil.
Fears he is not to recover.
Dread of death, with thoughts of suicide.
Great anxiety, is fearful and peevish.
Anguish, oppressive and vague fearfulness, or uneasiness, as if he had committed a crime. θ Cephalalgia.
Anxiety as if threatened with an epileptic fit ; depressed with grief.
Variable mood, at one time confident, at another timid.
Disposition quiet and resigned ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Moroseness.
Peevish and whining, with hot earlobes.
Easily startled.
Sufferings following anger.
Mental symptoms worse in morning on awaking.

Sensorium

Quickly passing vertigo in morning.
Vertigo : everything turns in a circle ; with nausea ; < before breakfast ; on opening eyes ; on stooping ; > after breakfast, and from wiping eyes ; nausea,
faintness, pain in nape of neck ; as if drunken ; with seeing white stars ; when closing eyes.
Stupefaction, with dread of falling forward.
Heaviness of head, with pale, languid face.
Dulness and numbness of head.
Inability to walk, except with eyes open, and in daytime. θ Locomotor ataxia.
Cloudiness and drunken feeling, alternating with pain in kidneys.
Easily made drunk, even by weakest spirituous drink.
When his eyes were closed, his whole body tottered ; if not firmly held, he fell to ground ; met. θ Spinal disease.

Inner head

Headache attended with nausea, pressure in forehead and congestion to eyes and nose, with nosebleed.
Pressure in forehead from without inward, or rather outward, or over eyes ; in evening, sometimes with a chill, or nocturnal heat or sweat.
Throbbing, frontal pain, < going up-stairs, or stepping.
Burning, pressive pain, with heat in forehead, while standing or sitting, > in open air.
Headache sometimes in left side, < by walking in open air.
Lacerating pain in head.
Severe stitches in brain, with nausea and dulness of mind.
Sensation in head as if its contents were in a vise, with a weight on top.
Headache : from chronic catarrhs of head ; with constipation ; > by lying quiet in bed, or resting head upon a cushion.
Heaviness of head, with pale, languid face ; vertex painful to touch.
Pulsations in vertex with congestion to eyes and nose.
Stupefying tightness in right temple, > by pressing upon it.
Heat in head.
Headache in region of both parietal bones. θ Spinal disease.
Pulsative headache in vertex, over right temple, early on waking.
Pain in vertex, < on moving head or stooping, > by pressure ; shooting in vertex on coughing.
Tightness, with drawing and beating in right side of occiput.
Pain in head and nape of neck, it increases on going to bed, and only leaves off in morning on rising.
Semilateral affections of head, old rheumatic affections, always appearing on same side.
Increased pulsation of temporal arteries. θ Spinal disease.

Outer head

Itching of scalp, with dry, white scales.
Humid scurf, < about temples, bleeding when scratched ; < in evening, or at new and full moon.
Scalp feels numb.
Pressure on forehead, as from a tight hat.
Headache, as if hair was pulled ; with nausea.
Falling off and excessive dryness of hair ; scalp sore when hair is touched ; creeping and titillation of scalp.
Pain in head and nape of neck < on going to bed ; leaves on rising in morning.
Itching on forehead.
Exanthema on forehead, feels as if glue had dried on it.

Sight and eyes

Far-sightedness.
Vision dim and eyes dry in evening. θ Chronic catarrh.
Seeing fiery spots ; met. θ Spinal disease.
White stars before eyes, with vertigo.
Dim-sightedness, like looking through a fog, or as if feathers were before eyes ; must rub eyes.
Objects appear yellow. θ Liver complaint.
Burning and pressure in eyes.
Red eyes with lachrymation.
Eyes inflamed, itching at inner canthus ; agglutination at night, and lachrymation by day ; yellow halo around candle ; burning and dryness, smarting, but with very little ulceration.
Sensation of coldness in eyes when walking in open air.
Spasmodic closure of lids at night, and burning in eyes in morning and evening. θ Ophthalmia.
Inclination to stare.
Strabismus of either eye ; especially from loss of power of internal rectus.
Pressure in eyes, which are sensitive to light.
Stitches in eyes.
In evening pressure in canthus as from a grain of sand.
Eyelids thickened, dry, burning.
Chronic granular lids.
Eyelids stick together with matter ; lachrymation.
Upper lids seem to hang down as if paralyzed, especially left. θ Old, dry granular lids.
Burning and dryness in lids every evening, with pain in internal canthus of left eye, with much dry mucus in morning on waking.
Burning, dryness ; burning on waking, especially on looking up, with dread of light.
Eyes generally better from being bathed.
Itching in canthi with burning.
Eyelashes fall out.
Tottering and falling when closing eyes ; met. θ Spinal disease.

Hearing and ears

Buzzing as if outside ear.
Humming ; roaring ; whistling ; sound as of large bells.
Redness and heat of one ear ; evenings.
Hot earlobes with peevishness and whining.
Sensation as if something lay before ear ; on blowing nose it is felt, swallowing removes it.
Stitches in ears, evening or night.
Purulent otorrhœa.
Crepitation in ears on swallowing or chewing.

Smell and nose

Sense of smell weak.
Nosebleed with pressure in forehead and congestion to eyes.
Disposition to colds in head.
Nose stopped up, more left side, with glairy mucus.
Fluent coryza, with frequent sneezing, free from one nostril, the other obstructed ; lachrymation.
Chronic nasal catarrh, with scurfy sore nostrils, and discharge of thick yellow mucus.
Catarrhs of long standing with old people.
Discharge of dry, hard, yellow-green mucus from nose ; nose swollen, red and sore to touch, worse in evening.
Nose dry ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Violent pain in root of nose. θ Ozæna.
Copious, yellow, sour-smelling mucus, with sore nostrils.
Septum narium swollen, red and painful to touch ; more painful evenings.
Redness of nose.
Nose ulcerated.
Swelling and hardness of left alæ nasi.
Point of nose cracked.
After blowing nose, glittering before eyes.

Upper face

Sallow skin.
Pale languid face with heaviness of head.
Tearing and lancinating in malar bone.
Tension of skin of face, as though white of egg had dried on it.
Itching of various parts of face ; of forehead, with rough skin.
Blood-boils on face and nose.
Tetter on temples and forearm. θ Leucorrhœa.
Gloomy, pale, or alternately red and pale.
Heat and redness ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Coppery cheeks.
Bloated places, like bulbous excrescences ; nodular swellings.

Lower face

Tension and drawing in jaws and cheeks, with increase of saliva.
Tensive pain in articulation of jaw, when chewing or opening mouth.
Upper lip covered with little blisters.
Lower jaw seems shortened.
Lips dry, chapped.
Involuntary spasmodic twitching of lower jaw, with hemorrhage of bowels ; dark, offensive stools.
Trismus.

Teeth and gums

Teeth feel long and sore.
Toothache ; teeth feel loose and elongated, < from chewing, in open air, evening.
Drawing toothache, extending to other parts, as down larynx, neck or shoulders. θ During pregnancy.
Teeth covered with sordes.
Swelling of gums ; they easily bleed and ulcerate.
Saltish blood seems to come from teeth.

Taste, speech, tongue

Taste flat ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Tongue coated with a thin slimy fur ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Taste : acrid , sweetish or fatty ; almost lost ; like blood.
Tingling, itching on tongue, must scratch it. θ During pregnancy.
Bites his tongue while asleep.

Inner mouth

Musty, bad odor from mouth.
Small ulcers in mouth.
Saliva increased, although mouth may feel dry.
Sensation of soreness in mouth when eating.
Increased saliva and mucus.
Dryness in mouth.

Palate and throat

Inflammatory redness in back of throat.
Transient stitches in throat.
Dryness of throat, as if parched.
Rawness and roughness in throat, inducing hawking or coughing in evening, with secretion of mucus.
Pressure in throat as from a plug, with soreness and dryness.
Sensation of swelling in sides of throat.
Sense of constriction from pharynx down to stomach, as if food could not pass.
Great dryness of throat especially on awaking, voice husky ; constant hawking, and sensation of a lump in throat. θ Chronic catarrh.
Feeling of a splinter in throat, stinging on swallowing.
Copious, thick, tenacious mucus in throat, evening and morning on awaking ; can be expectorated only in lumps, with great effort.
Thick mucus, dropping from posterior nares.
Ulcers in fauces, spongy ; secreting a yellowish-brown, badly smelling pus ; with boring pains from fauces to right temple and head.
Painful soreness in throat and upper part of œsophagus, < swallowing empty.
Throat feels relaxed.
Feels food whole length of œsophagus.
Swallowing painful, > after warm drinks ; swallowing saliva or liquids often > ; swallows solids with difficulty.
On waking in morning, pharynx feels narrower than usual, as if contracted and lame.
Violent pressive pain, as if a portion of œsophagus was contracted or compressed, in middle of chest, especially during deglutition, but also when not swallowing, with oppression of chest, alternately with palpitation of heart, especially after a meal.
Swallowing causes crepitation in ears.
Pains in throat ; < evening and night.

Appetite, thirst. desires, aversions

No desire to eat.
Has no appetite, food has no taste.
Irregular appetite.
Longing for fruit and vegetables ; potatoes disagree.
Aversion to meat ; to beer ; meat has no taste.
Thirst all day.
Appetite for starch, chalk ; clean white rags ; charcoal, cloves, acids, coffee or tea-grounds, dry rice, and other indigestible things. θ Chlorosis.

Eating and drinking

Before eating : canine hunger ; seems to quiver all over.
Better while eating.
Worse from eating potatoes. θ Colic. θ Indigestion.
Worse from tobacco smoke.
All irritating things, like salt, wine, vinegar, pepper, etc., immediately start cough.
Throat sore after using onions in food.
Easily drunken from weakest spirituous drinks.
Mucus in throat, tasting sweet, after dinner.
Worse from cold, > from warm diet.
Worse after eating soups.
After eating : languor in evening ; must lie down at noon ; phlegm in chest.
Eating removes faintness at stomach.
After breakfast : vertigo ; nausea better.
After dinner : sweet tasting mucus.
Aggravation or appearance of all symptoms immediately after dinner or in evening.
Worse from warm drink : chill.
Better from warm drink : throat.

Hiccough, belching, nausea and vomiting

Hiccough, Belching, Nausea and Vomiting
Chronic inclination to belch, in old people.
Eructations : sour ; bitter, after potatoes ; < evenings.
Heartburn after supper ; sourish risings, with profuse flow of water from mouth.
Nausea : with vertigo ; stitches in brain ; chilliness ; pale face, desire to lie down, faintness ; > after breakfast.
Frequent nausea ; faint nausea.
Vomits mucus and water.
Vomiting of food, mucus or bile ; met. θ Spinal disease.

Scrobiculum and stomach

Distension of stomach.
Constriction and twisting in stomach, extending up œsophagus to throat.
Stitches in pit of stomach, extending upward to chest.
Drawing or oppressive pain, going upward to chest and throat ; after potatoes.

Hypochondria

Pains in epigastrium and hypochondria when stooping.
Contractions in both hypochonders.
Spasmodic pains in hypochondria and stomach with dyspnœa almost to suffocation.
Liver pains, as if bruised, when stooping ; stitches when rising again.
Tearing from liver to hip.
Shooting pain in region of spleen.
Stitches in both hypochondria ; < from motion.
Shooting in left hypochondrium going upward and forward to cardiac region, < on deep inspiration.

Abdomen and loins

Seems to hang down heavily, like a load, when walking, afternoons.
Reaching too high strains abdominal muscles.
Pains < sitting bent.
Pressing in both groins, towards sexual organs, evenings.
Stitching, pressing pain in region of abdominal ring, like from hernia, with tension as far as side of abdomen.
Flatulent colic, bellyache.
Colic in morning.
Painters' colic.
Soreness and twitching of right inguinal glands.

Stools and rectum

Inactivity of rectum ; even soft stool requires great straining.
No desire for, and no ability to pass stool, until there is a large accumulation.
After each dysenteric stool, involuntary urination.
Severe hemorrhage from bowels with flow of urine. θ Typhoid.
Pressing to stool aggravates her symptoms.
Tenesmus in rectum and bladder at same time. θ Proctitis.
Stools too scanty.
Stools : hard and knotty or covered with mucus ; like sheep's dung, with cutting in anus, followed by blood ; like pipe stems.
Constipation from great dryness of mucous follicles of rectum, with long-lasting pain in rectum.
Diarrhœa, urging in rectum, bloody, scanty stools.
Clots of blood pass from anus.
Dropping of blood during an evacuation.
Hemorrhoids, < in evening, > after night's rest.
Itching and burning at anus.
Perineum : pressure when blowing nose ; sweats and is tender to touch.
Soft and thin stool, passing with difficulty.
Chronic diarrhœa ; < on alternate days ; from walking ; > from a short sleep or warm applications.
Diarrhœa whenever she urinates.
Chronic diarrhœa. θ Chlorosis.
Blind piles protrude, become moist, with lancinating pain ; are hard and itch.
During stool : rectum as if constricted and dried up ; throbbing in small of back ; excoriated feeling in rectum ; chills all over ; discharge of prostatic juice.
Varices become moist, sting and burn.
Itching with burning excoriation and great sensitiveness. θ Hemorrhoids.
Fistula ani.
Sensation of weakness of sphincter ani.
Pulsating in anus.
Torpidity of rectum ; rectum seems paralyzed.
Itching of anus.

Urinary organs

Renal pains as from riding over a rough road ; alternating with cloudiness as if drunk ; dancing makes worse.
Frequent micturition. θ Prolapsus uteri.
Tenesmus vesicæ. θ Dysentery.
Urine voided while straining at stool ; or cannot pass urine without such straining.
Frequent urination at night.
Frequent emissions of very small quantities of lightcolored urine with great straining, severe smarting and burning, with a feeling as though a few drops remained in urethra which could not be expelled.
Urine : scanty, with red sediment, in arthritic affections ; copious and pale, in nervous diseases ; with thick, white sediment ; more frequent, copious and dark.
Urine red without sediment ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Feeling of weakness in bladder and genitals, in evening, with fear that he will wet the bed.
Pouting of meatus urinarius, with swelling and discharge of light yellow pus from urethra.
During urination : burning, with discharge of urine and desire to evacuate bowels.
Urine smarting, corroding. θ Prolapsus uteri.

Male sexual organs

Excessive sexual desire.
Frequent and painful erections, < at night.
Involuntary emissions, followed by all his old symptoms.
Sexual desire lessened. θ Impotence.
Feeling of weakness in bladder and genitals ; he fears he will wet the bed.
Discharge of prostatic fluid during difficult stool.
Light yellow pus from urethra, causing itching of glans penis.
Sensation of weakness in penis.
Left testicle hard and very painful.
Tickling on genitals and thighs.
Sweat on perineum, with sensitiveness to touch.
Pressure in perineum at beginning of an erection or during coitus.

Female sexual organs

Sexual desire decreased.
Weakness of sexual parts.
Prolapsus uteri.
Bland, painless ulcers upon os. θ Prolapsus uteri.
Severe painful swelling in either or both ovaries, very sensitive to touch. θ Metritis.
During an evacuation before menses, she has pinching, writhing and pressing like labor-pains.
Menses : too early, short, scanty, and of pale blood ; too early ; preceded by headache ; delay, finally appear, being pale and scanty.
Menses scanty, pale and painful. θ Prolapsus uteri.
Before menses : many dreams, on awaking face hot, headache and palpitation ; abundant mucous discharge.
During menses : corroding urine and diarrhœa ; bloatedness.
After menses : exhausted in body and mind. θ Leucorrhœa.
Leucorrhœa : of transparent mucus, attended with tremor and sensation as if everything would fall out of abdomen ; acrid, corrosive ; profuse, relieved by cold washing ; during day ; with tetter on temples ; corroding, profuse,
running down to heels, often only in daytime, relieved by cold washes.
Painful throbbing in left side of vagina, like the tick of a watch.
Stitches in l. side of vulva, extending up to chest.
Free light yellow excoriating discharge from vagina.
Itching and burning pimples on labia.
Inflammation and swelling of vagina.
Stitches, throbbing and itching in vagina. θ Prolapsus uteri.

Pregnancy. parturition. lactation

Gastric and abdominal symptoms during pregnancy : heartburn ; constipation from inactive rectum ; groaning at
night, crying out "it is not I," begging them to stop ; tongue tingles ; mucous leucorrhœa, which runs down limbs.
Itching in mamma.
Constipation of sucklings.

Voice and larynx. trachea and bronchia

Voice : has a nasal twang ; husky ; rough.
Hoarseness, evening and night, especially towards morning ; disappearing while walking in open air.
Sudden, complete aphonia.
Hoarseness.
Hoarse afternoons and evenings, with roughness and dryness.
Voice hoarse, rough, hollow, almost aphonic ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Much talking, particularly in lively company, makes her hoarse.
Talking or singing makes him cough.
Talking increases soreness of chest.
Rawness in larynx on awaking.
Tickling in larynx, with irritation to cough.
Sensation of tightly adhering phlegm in larynx, not removed by hawking or cough ; wheezing on inspiration.
Thyroid cartilage painful to touch.
Throat dry and voice husky on waking.

Respiration

Rattling, asthmatic breathing ; < coughing.
Oppression < when sitting stooped ; > straightening up, or walking in open air.
Talking or singing makes him cough.
Breathing arrested by copious, thick, tenacious, saltish mucus.
Oppressive pain in chest, tight feeling.
Dyspnœa, with spasmodic pains in stomach and hypochondria.
Short-breathed when lying on back ; goes off by turning on side.
Worse getting tired from exerting voice.
Worse from deep inspiration ; shooting from left hypochondria to heart.
Wheezing inspiration, with tough mucus in larynx.

Cough

Dry, hacking cough, with frequent sneezing.
Cough : from sensation as of loose skin hanging in throat ; from tickling in larynx ; from elongated uvula ; from talking or singing ; short ; causes pains in right temple and
top of head, sometimes also difficult breathing ; soon after waking in morning ; every morning a long attack of dry cough, ending in difficult raising of a little white mucus ; with
tearing pain and involuntary emission of urine, in old or withered looking people ; sudden, violent irrepressible cough in evening while sitting ; sometimes yields a piece of mucus mixed with blood ; causes shooting in vertex.
All irritating things excite cough.
Painless evening cough.
Dry cough at night, with dryness of throat.
Continued dry hacking cough, with vomiting and arrest of breathing.
Sputum difficult and of a putrid taste.

Inner chest and lungs

Chronic bronchitis with inclination to sing.
Constriction of chest, with apprehension.
Oppression of chest, with constriction in œsophagus.
Violent, oppressive pain in chest, < at night.
Chest feels constricted, < from sitting bent or stooping, > on straightening up, or on walking.
Congestion of blood to chest and head, with redness of face and one ear, caused by suppressed hemorrhoidal flux.
Shooting stitches in chest right to left in afternoon, < on going down-stairs.
Talking increases soreness of chest ; lifting aggravates or produces soreness in left chest.
Riding in a carriage gives pain in chest.
When stooping, a stitch from left side of abdomen to middle of chest.
Stitches extending from left side of vulva to chest.
Chest feels as if too large.
Chilliness in chest.

Heart, pulse and circulation

In cardiac region : shocks ; shooting from left hypochonder.
Awakens with palpitation.
Palpitation of heart. θ Prolapsus uteri. θ Dysphagia.
Palpitation irregular, large and small beats intermixed.
Pulse either unchanged, or full and accelerated.
Pulse hard, 90 to 100 ; met. θ Spinal disease.

Neck and back

Itching in nape of neck and of throat.
Shooting in right side of neck, posterior portion.
Pain in back and small of back, as if beaten.
Pain in back, as if a hot iron was thrust through lower vertebræ.
At intervals, sudden sharp pains like a stab in lower part of back, which made her feel for the moment as if she could not straighten spine.
Cervical muscles drew head back during sleep ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Violent stitch in middle of back.
Gnawing pain in back.
Throbbing in small of back during stool.
Pain in small of back during rest.
Pain in sacrum. θ Uterine troubles.

Upper limbs

Skin of hands peels off.
Red rhagades on hands, worse in winter and from washing.
Panaritium, with brittle nails, lancinating pains and tendency to ulceration of finger-tips.
Brittle nails and brittle skin on tips of fingers.
Nails brittle, or thick ; spots on nails.
Pain in arms when letting them hang down, or on stretching in bed.
Sudden jerk or concussion in shoulder.
Pain, as from a sprain, in shoulder joint, especially on raising arm.
Sense of tightness in arm, as from cold.
Burning on arms and fingers, and in elbow, as from a glowing iron.
Arms feel heavy, as if paralyzed ; they go to sleep.
Arms feel shorter.
Tetter on forearm. θ Leucorrhœa.
Veins of hands distended.
Gnawing beneath finger nails, with crawling along arm, as far as clavicle.
Stitches in wrist while working.

Lower limbs

Tearing in thighs and legs, when sitting and lying, especially at night.
Long continued tension in thighs and legs, almost like a cramp, extending downward.
Legs feel numb and stiff, especially at night.
Nates go to sleep when sitting.
Great heaviness in lower limbs, can scarcely drag them ; when walking he staggers, and must sit down ; evenings.
Burning and smarting itching on thighs, > from scratching.
Frequent cramps in calves.
Tearing in knees and patellæ, or from knee to toes.
Trembling of knees.
Numbness of heel when stepping.
Soles of feet too sore to step on.
Pain in sole of foot, on stepping, as though it were too soft and swollen. θ Tabes dorsalis.
Itching and redness of toes, < after scratching.
Stitches in corns and toes.
Great weariness of legs when sitting.
Heaviness in feet with great lassitude of legs.
Cold feet, followed by burning under toes.
Smarting stitches in corns.
Pain as from fatigue, in articulation of foot when sitting.

Limbs in general

Arms and legs feel heavy.
Frequent stretching of limbs when sitting.
Trembling of limbs.
Jerking and twitching of limbs.
Pains in limbs as if bones were squeezed narrower, with pressure in joints.
Drawing in extremities.

Rest. position. motion

Resting head relieves headache.
Raising head : increases vertigo, nausea and vomiting ; met. θ Spinal disease.
During rest : pain in small of back.
Aversion to motion.
Complaints from carrying on back ; or bodily exertion.
Pain in chest from lifting or carrying things.
Stitches in hypochondria, worse from motion.
Moderate exercise (in open air) relieves.
Walking about or moving feet relieves uneasiness.
Headache, > lying, < walking in open air.
When attempting to walk, great weakness and uncertainty in lower limbs, has to be led ; met. θ Spinal disease.
When walking : abdomen hangs heavily ; discharge of dark blood from rectum ; fluor albus more profuse.
Talking or a short walk fatigues very much ; causes numbness of limbs, flushes of heat.
Lying down : > headache ; < lassitude, yet there is desire to lie down.
Going down-stairs : stitches in chest.
Worse from dancing : renal pains.
Worse ascending : frontal headache.
Stepping : < frontal headache ; numbness of heel ; pain in sole of foot.
Straining, lifting, etc., cause soreness in chest and abdomen.
Reaching high : strains abdominal muscles.
Sitting : weariness of legs ; pain in foot joint ; stretching limbs.
Sitting bent : pain in abdomen < ; oppressed respiration ; constriction in chest.
Stooping : vertigo ; pain in vertex ; constriction of chest ; pain in scrobiculum, liver, hypochondria and abdomen ; stitch from abdomen to chest.
Short-breathed lying on back, not on side.
Better lying on left side ; < lying on right.
Worse from standing and sitting : pain and heat in forehead.

Nerves

Want of bodily irritability.
Great exhaustion of strength, especially after walking in open air ; accompanied by yawning, stretching, drowsiness and inclination to lie down ; lying, however, increases lassitude.
Much fatigued by talking.
Faint and tired, must sit down.
Involuntary movements of single parts.
Spasms, with attacks of laughing and weeping.
Paralysis from spinal disease ; cannot walk with eyes closed.
Rheumatic and traumatic paralysis, in gouty patients.
One-sided paralysis, especially of extensors.
Hysteria. θ Prolapsus uteri.
Excited condition of mind and body ; acute smell, red face, tingling tongue, constriction in internal parts, involuntary jerks, all alternating with dulness of sight, loss of smell, pale face, lassitude and drowsiness.
Tremor. θ Leucorrhœa and prolapsus.
Tremulousness, when he touches anything, he feels electrified.
Suddenly jerks head backward ; involuntary motions ; laughing and crying.
Slow tottering gait, as after severe illness.

Sleep

Drowsiness by day.
Lies awake from crowding of ideas or fancies, or from heaviness in arms.
Sleepiness, with inclination to lie down.
Unrefreshing night sleep ; a mere slumbering, with feeling in morning as if he had not slept enough. θ Cephalalgia.
Restless sleep ; turns frequently ; feels too warm ; lies uncovered in unrefreshing slumber, with many dreams and frequent awaking ; starts in affright ; muttering or crying.
Restless sleep, always awaking with palpitation of heart.
Dreams, anxious ; of boat foundering ; ghosts ; thieves ; confused.
During sleep : lies on side ; bites his tongue.
Frequent urination in night.
During sleep cervical muscles drew head backward ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Worse on awaking : mind ; weak and faint, until he eats ; wakes unrefreshed ; heat in face ; huskiness ; dryness in throat, tenacious mucus ; rawness in larynx ; palpitation.

Time

Time passes too slowly.
Remission from evening until morning.
Worse evening and night : throat complaints.
Towards morning : hoarseness.
Before breakfast : vertigo, faint nausea, relieved after eating.
Morning : mental depression ; transient vertigo ; pain in head and neck > ; burning in eyes ; dry mucus in eyes ; cough and sputa ; pressure on chest ; colic.
Worse morning and evening : burning of eyes ; mucus in throat.
Worse all day : mucous leucorrhœa ; drowsiness.
Worse alternate days : constipation ; chronic diarrhœa ; prolapsus uteri ; chlorosis.
Worse afternoon : hoarseness.
Worse evening : apprehension ; tetter on scalp ; dim sight, dryness, pressure and burning in eyes ; spasmodic closure of eyelids ; one ear red and hot ; tearing and stitches in ear ; ozæna ; toothache ; pains in throat ;
eructations ; hemorrhoids ; weakness in bladder ; hoarseness ; languor ; heaviness in lower limbs ; heat.
On going to bed : pains in head and neck.
From 4 P. M. till going to bed she feels well. θ Melancholy.
At night : headache < ; spasmodic closure of lids ; pains in throat < ; frequent urination ; pain in chest <.
New and full moon : tetter on scalp ; heat.

Temperature and weather

Unpleasant want of animal heat.
Warm food and drinks relieve throat.
She feels better in open air. θ Prolapsus uteri.
Takes cold easily sitting in room, gets hoarse ; this lessens when walking in open air.
Generally > in warmth ; < in cold air, outdoors.
Better walking, outdoors, in mild weather ; inclination to be in open air.
Cannot bear the cold, nor a warm room.
Warmth of bed : body itches.
Open air : pain in forehead, dulness of sight, cold feeling in eyes ; toothache < ; hoarseness ; oppressed breathing > ; chilliness with headache.
Worse in dry weather ; thin fecal stools.
Winter : rhagades ; eruptions.
Cold washing : leucorrhœa > ; rhagades.
Better in wet weather or moistening the diseased part.

Fever

Chill : with great thirst ; with nausea.
Internal chill and shivering, with desire for warmth of stove, with stretching and bending of limbs, < after warm drink ; often with heat of face.
Chill during day, heat at night.
Frequent repetition of chills in evening.
Heat at night, with anxiety and sweat.
Heat in evening, commencing in and spreading from face, sometimes of only right side.
Chill appeared after eating soup at dinner. θ Intermittent.
Slight chill in evening ; met. θ Spinal disease.
Sweat at night, towards morning most profuse in face, frequently only on right side of face ; less when walking out of doors.
Entire inability to sweat.

Attacks, periodicity

At intervals sudden, sharp pains, like a stab.
Worse at new and full moon. θ Skin symptoms.
Worse in winter. θ Skin symptoms.
Worse on alternate days. θ Chronic diarrhœa. θ Chlorosis.
θ Prolapsus uteri.

Locality and direction

Complaints chiefly in external parts (burning, etc.).
Semilateral affections of head.
Paralysis left sided, painless.
Pains go upward.
Jerks go from head over body.
Upper left, lower right side, most affected.
Drawing toothache, extending to other parts, as down to larynx, neck, shoulder, etc.
Left : headache ; upper lid hangs down ; pain in internal canthus ; side of nose stopped up ; throbbing from hypochondria to heart ; throbbing in vagina ; stitches in vulva.
Right : heat and sweat of face ; inguinal glands sore and swollen ; shooting in side of neck.
Right to left : stitches in lungs.

Sensations

Cloudiness and drunken feeling ; as if contents of head were in a vise ; pressure on forehead as from a tight hat ; as if hair was pulled ; pressure as from a grain of sand in canthus ; as if something lay before ear ; as if white of egg had dried
on face ; teeth feel long and sore ; as from a plug or lump in throat ; as if food could not pass to stomach ; as of a splinter in throat ; pharynx feels narrower on waking, as if contracted and lame ; abdomen seems to hang down heavily ; rectum as if
paralyzed ; renal pains as from riding over a rough road ; as if a few drops remained in urethra ; as if everything would fall out of abdomen : like tick of a watch in left side of vagina ; as of tightly adhering phlegm in larynx ; as of loose skin hanging in
throat ; as if beaten in small of back ; as if a hot iron was thrust through lower vertebræ ; like a stab in lower part of back ; sudden jerk or concussion in shoulder ; arms feel shorter ; as from fatigue in articulation of foot ; as if bones were
squeezed narrower ; feels electrified when touching anything.
Pain : in vertex ; in head and nape of neck ; in root of nose ; in throat ; in epigastrium and hypochondria ; in l. testicle ; in back ; in small of back ; in sacrum ; in arms ; in sole of foot.
Burning : in forehead ; in eyes ; of lids ; at anus ; in varices ; in urethra ; pimples on labia ; on arms and fingers ; on elbow ; on thighs ; under toes.
Tearing : in malar bone ; from liver to hip ; in thighs and legs ; in knees and patellæ ; from knees to toes.
Lancinating : in malar bone ; in hemorrhoids ; in finger tips.
Lacerating : in head.
Gnawing pain : in back ; beneath finger nails.
Cutting : in anus.
Stitches : in brain ; in eyes ; in ears ; in throat ; in pit of stomach ; in liver ; in both hypochondria ; in region of abdominal ring ; in left side of vulva ; in vagina ; in middle of back.
Shooting stitches : in chest, right to left ; from left hypochonder to cardiac region ; in wrist ; in corns and toes.
Smarting stitches : in corns.
Shooting : in vertex ; in region of spleen ; from left hypochondrium to cardiac region.
Stinging : on swallowing ; in varices.
Drawing : in right side of occiput ; in jaws and cheeks ; toothache, extending to other parts ; from stomach to chest and throat ; in extremities.
Painful throbbing : in left side of vagina.
Spasmodic pains : in hypochondria and stomach.
Pressive pain : in forehead ; as if a portion of œsophagus was contracted in middle of chest.
Tensive pain : in articulation of jaw.
Bruised pains : of liver.
Soreness : of scalp ; in mouth ; in throat, or right inguinal glands ; in chest ; of soles of feet.
Smarting : in urethra.
Rawness : in throat ; in larynx.
Excoriated feeling : in rectum.
Urging : in rectum.
Pressure : in forehead ; over eyes ; in eyes ; in throat ; in both groins ; in perineum ; in joints.
Constriction : from pharynx to stomach ; in stomach ; in œsophagus ; of rectum ; of chest.
Contractions : in both hypochonders.
Cramps : in calves.
Tightness : in right side of occiput ; in chest ; in arm.
Tension : of skin of face ; in jaws ; in region of abdominal ring ; in thighs and legs.
Stupefying tightness : in right temple.
Beating : in right side of occiput.
Throbbing : in small of back.
Pulsations : in vertex ; over right temple ; in temporal arteries increased ; in anus ; in vagina.
Roughness : in throat.
Sprained feeling : in shoulder joint.
Swollen feeling : in sides of throat ; in sole of foot.
Weakness : of sphincter ani ; in bladder and genitals ; in penis ; of female sexual parts ; of legs.
Heaviness : of head ; in abdomen ; of arms ; in lower limbs ; in arms and legs.
Oppressive pain : in chest ; in feet.
Weight : on top of head.
Paralyzed feeling : of arms.
Numbness : of head ; of scalp ; in legs ; of heel.
Tingling : in tongue.
Itching : of scalp ; at inner canthus ; of canthi ; of various parts of face ; on tongue ; at anus ; of piles ; of glans penis ; of pimples on labia ; in vagina ; in mamma ; in nape of neck ; of thighs ; on
thighs ; of throat ; of toes ; of whole body.
Crawling : along arm as far as clavicle.
Creeping titillation : of scalp.
Tickling : on genitals and thighs ; in larynx.
Heat : in head.
Coldness : in eyes ; of feet.
Stiffness : in legs.
Dryness : of hair ; in eyes ; of lids ; in mouth ; of throat ; in throat.

Tissues

Veins distended.
Mucous membranes very dry or secreting scantily.
Emaciation.
Chlorosis.
Scrofula.

Touch. passive motion. injuries

Injuries. Touch and pressure relieve pain in right temple.
Sensitive to touch : vertex ; scalp ; perineum ; ovaries.
Better from scratching, but bleeding follows.
Pressing teeth together aggravates.
Better from wiping eyes.
Riding in carriage gives her pain in chest.

Skin

Skin yellow. θ Liver complaint.
Intolerable itching of whole body, especially when getting warm in bed ; scratches until skin bleeds, which is then painful.
Eruptions humid, scabby, sore, gnawing.
Ulcerated surface secretes a yellow-brownish, badly smelling pus.
Blood-boils. Rhagades. Bulbous excrescences.
Leprosy.
Dry, tettery, itching eruption.
Tetter itching in evening.
Formication in skin.

Stage of life, constitution

Suitable to persons of a scrofulous habit who suffer from chronic diseases.
Constitutions with diminished animal heat.
Infancy : constipation, especially when artificial food is used.
Cholera infantum, stools green ; acidity of primæ viæ.
Puberty : chlorosis, with longing for indigestible substances.
Dark complexion, excitable.
Mild disposition : mild, tearful, anxious. θ Constipation and catarrh.
Spare habit ; dry, thin subjects.
Boy, æt. 12, cerebro-spinal disease. After Bellad., Phos. and Nux vom. had been given with very little improvement, Alum. met. [30] cured.
Old people, hypochondriacal, or suffering from chronic diseases, especially catarrhs.
Vertigo in old people, with atheromata or earthy deposits on the cerebral or cardiac arteries.
Chronic catarrh of head.
Cough with involuntary emission of urine in old withered looking people.

Relations

Similar to : Bar. carb . (hypochondriasis of aged ; constipation) ; Bryon . (peevish, irritable ; gastric and abdominal symptoms ; constipation ; throbbing headache ; dry
cough with vomiting ; stitches in chest ; dryness of mucous surfaces ; fever, etc.) ; Calc. ostr. ; Chamom . (useful as an intermediate remedy) ; Conium (old people ; loss of power of
internal recti of eyes) ; Ferrum (chlorosis ; relaxed abdomen ; disgust for meat, etc.) ; Ferr. jod . (profuse, transparent leucorrhœa) ; Graphit. (chlorosis ; skin rough, chapped,
itching ; nails ; blepharitis, etc.) ; Ipec. ; Laches . (sad on waking ; climaxis) ; Pulsat . (tearful, peevish ; head, etc., better in open air ; ozæna ; taste lost ;
averse to meat ; chlorosis ; scanty menses ; complaints at puberty ; lack of animal heat ; soles of feet sore, < walking ; toes red, itching, etc.) ; Plumbum (colic ; constipation, etc.) ; Ruta
(loss of power of internal recti of eyes) ; Sepia (irritable, tearful ; ozæna ; scanty menses ; puberty ; prolapsus uteri ; inactive rectum ; weakness in urinary organs, etc.) ; Silic. ;
Sulphur ; Zincum (inner canthus ; granular lids).
Compare with the following in clergyman's sore throat : Arg. nitr., Kali bich., Lycop ., etc.
Alumin . follows : Bryon., Laches., Sulphur ; and is followed by : Bryon .
Alumin . and Bryon . are complementary.
Antidotes to Alumin . : Bryon., Camphor, Chamom., Ipec .
Alumin. antidotes : lead-poisoning, as in painter's colic ; ailments from lead.

Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica

James Tyler Kent · Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica · homeoint.org / Séror HTML text (Kent d. 1916; public domain)

Alumen and Alumina

This remedy comes in very nicely after Alumen, which has much Alumina in its nature and depends largely upon Alumina, which is its base, for its way of working.

It occurs to me to throw out a little hint. When you have a good substantial proving of an oxide or a carbonate, and the mental symptoms are well brought out, you can use these, in a measure in a presumptive way, in prescribing another salt, with the same base, which has a few mental symptoms in its proving.

For instance, you have a group of symptoms decidedly relating to Alumen.

The mental symptoms of Alumen, however, have not been brought out to any extent, but still you have the mental symptoms of the base of Alumen, which is the oxide, so that if the patient has the mental symptoms of Alumina and the physical symptoms of Alumen, you can rationally presume that Alumen will cure because of the Aluminum in each.

Because of its relation to Alumina further provings; will undoubtedly develop the fact that it has many spinal symptoms. It is well known that it has a weak spine, with coldness of the spine, a feeling as if cold water were poured own the back.

Pain in the dorsal spine on a line with the inferior angle of the scapulae; weakness in this region and in the shoulders.

Like Alumina it has the sensation of constriction, as of a cord or band around the limbs. Feeling as if a cord were drawn tightly around the upper arm.

The clumsiness of the fingers, as seen in dropping things, the pain in the lower limbs at night, the lassitude and numbness, are other manifestations of spinal symptoms.

Sensation as of a cord around the leg under the knee; soles sensitive to pressure on walking; feet numb and cold, although warmly covered; legs cold to knees.

These are all further evidences of the action of the remedy on the spinal cord. Bruised pain in all the limbs. Crawling, tingling paralysis of all the limbs.

He is kept awake at night by a sensation as if the blood rushed through the body. Many complaints come on during sleep. Night mare. He is sensitive to weather changes and very sensitive to cold.

Mind

We know the mental symptoms of Alumina fairly well.

It especially takes hold of the intellect and so confuses the intelligence that the patient is unable to effect a decision; the judgment is disturbed.

He is unable to realize; the things that he knows or has known to be real seem to him to be unreal, and he is in doubt as to whether they are so or not.

In the Guiding Symptoms this is not so plainly expressed, but in the Chronic Diseases we have a record of this which is the best expression of it that occurs anywhere.

There we read:

"When he says anything he feels as if another person had said it, and when he sees anything, as if another person had seen it, or as if he could transfer himself into another and only then could see."

That is to say, there is a confusion of mind, a confusion of ideas and thoughts. It has cured these symptoms.

The consciousness of his personal identity is confused. He is not exactly certain who he was; it seemed as though he were not himself.

He is in a dazed condition of mind. He makes mistakes in writing and speaking! uses words not intended; uses wrong words.

Confusion and obscuration of e intellect. Inability to follow up a train of thought. Then he enters into another state, in which he gets into a hurry. Nothing moves fast enough; time seems so slow; everything is delayed; nothing goes right.

Besides this he has impulses. When he sees sharp instruments or blood, impulses rise up within him and he shudders because of these impulses. An instrument that could be used for murder or for killing causes these impulses to arise; impulse to kill herself.

The Alumina patient is very sad, constantly sad. Incessantly moaning; groaning, worrying, fretting and in a hurry.

Wants to get away; wants to get away from this place, hoping that things will be better; full of fears.

All sorts of imaginations. A sort of general apprehensiveness. When he meditates upon this state of mind he thinks he is going to lose his reason.

He thinks about this frenzy and hurry and confusion of mind, how he hardly knows his own name, and how fretful he is, and he wonders if he is not going crazy, and finally he really thinks he is going crazy.

Most of the mental symptoms come on in the morning on waking. Sadness and weeping on waking in the morning. His moods alternate.

Sometimes his mental state is a little improved and his mood changes into a quiet placid state, and again he goes into fear and apprehensiveness. Some evil is going to take place and he is full of anxiety. Anxiety about the future.

Nerves and weakness

The next most striking feature is the way in which the remedy acts upon the nerves that proceed from the spine.

There is a state of weakness of the muscles supplied by these nerves; weakness over the whole body. There is difficulty in swallowing, a paralytic condition of the oesophagus; difficulty in raising or moving the arms; paralysis of one side of the body, or paralysis of the muscles of the lower extremities, or of the bladder and rectum.

The paralytic state begins as a sort of a semi - paralysis, for a long time merely an inactivity, which grows at length into a complete paralytic condition. Everything is slowed down.

The conductivity of the nerves is impaired so that a prick of a pin upon the extremities is not felt until a second or so afterwards. All of his senses are impaired in this way until it really means a benumbing of the consciousness and appears to be a kind of stupefaction of his intellect, a mental sluggishness. Impressions reach his mind with a marked degree of slowness.

The paralytic state runs through the remedy and is observed in various parts in many ways. The bladder manifests it in the slowness with which the urine passes.

A woman sits a long time before the flow starts, with inability to press, and then the stream flows slowly. The patient will say she cannot burry the flow of urine. The urine is slow to start and slow to flow, and sometimes only dribbles. At times it is retained and dribbles involuntarily.

This slowness is observed also in the rectum. Its tone is lost and there is inability to perform the ordinary straining when sitting at stool, and so paretic is the rectum that it may be full and distended, and the quantity of faeces enormous, and yet, though the stool is soft, there is constipation.

In this remedy there is often a hard stool, but we notice that the remedy will do the best work where there is this paretic condition of the rectum with soft stool. If the mental symptoms however, are present, such as I have described, with large, hard and knotty or lumpy stool, Alumina will cure.

Now, so great is the straining to pass a soft stool that you will sometimes hear a patient describe the state as follows:

When sitting upon the seat she must wait a long time, though there is fullness and she has gone many days without stool; she has the consciousness that, she should pass a stool and is conscious of the fullness in the rectum, yet she will sit a long time and finally will undertake to help herself by pressing down violently with the abdominal muscles, straining vigorously, yet conscious that very little effort is made by the rectum itself.

She will continue to strain, covered with copious sweat, hanging on to the seat, if there be any place to hang on to, and will pull and work as if in labor, and at last is able to expel a soft stool, yet with the sensation that more stool remains.

Of course a number of other remedies have this straining to pass a soft stool, but they have their own characteristics. Take for example an individual who cannot keep awake; she says that it is impossible for her to read a line without going to sleep; that she can sleep all the time; she suffers night and day from a dry mouth, and the tongue cleave to the roof of the mouth.

Now let her describe this state of straining and struggling to expel a soft stool, and you hardly need to go any further before you know the remedy.

If that patient in addition to what she has said tells you that she is in the habit of fainting when standing any length of time, that she is disturbed in a close room and has all sorts of complaints in the cold air, it is Nux moschata.

Now you see how easy it is for remedies to talk; they tell their own story. Suppose a woman should come to you who has been suffering from haemorrhage, from prolonged oozing, who is pallid and weak and is distended with flatulence, with much belching and passing of gas, and the more she passes the worse she feels, and she has these same symptoms of straining a long time to pass a soft stool, tremendous effort with inactivity of the rectum. You could do nothing but give her China.

Now you know how easy it is for remedies to talk and tell their own story.

By allowing remedies to talk and tell their own story, individualization is accomplished.

I have said all that to show that it is not upon the inactivity of the rectum that you are to decide upon the remedy.

Individualization must be made through the patient. That is a principle that should never be violated. You may have twenty remedies all possessing a certain symptom but if you have a few real decided things that you can say about the patient, the manner in which he does business, the manner in which the disease affects the entire man, then you have something to individualize by.

You have seen the Alumina patient, the China patient and the Nux moschata patient. The sole duty of the physician is to treat the sick, which means to study the patient himself until an idea of the sickness is obtained.

Vertigo

This medicine is full of vertigo; he quivers, reels and "objects go round" almost constantly. It corresponds to the vertigo of tired-out people, old broken down patients, men worn out from old age.

Vertigo also that comes on when closing the eyes, as is found in spinal affections, in sclerosis of posterior lateral columns.

Alumina has produced affections analogous to locomotor ataxia. It produces numbness of the soles of the feet, the fulgurating pains, the vertigo when closing the eyes, and produces staggering and disturbances of coordination.

It is true that in an early stage of locomotor ataxia Alumina will check the disease process by bringing into order the internal state of the economy.

With Aluminum metallicum I have, stopped fulgurating pains in old incurable cases, and improved the reflexes wonderfully, thus showing the general improvement of the patient.

Modalities

Most of the symptoms are < on rising in the morning.

In the morning as I have mentioned it, the urine is slower to pass than after, he has moved about and warmed up a little. His limbs are stiffer in the morning and in the morning he has to whip up his mental state. He wakes up confused and wonders where he is.

You will see that in children especially-they wake up in the morning in a bewildered state, such as you will find in Alumina, Aesculus, Lycopod.

He has to put his mind on things to ascertain whether they be so or not, as to how things should look and wonders whether he is at home or in some other place.

There are many headaches with nausea and vomiting. The headaches come whenever he takes cold. This probably is due to the catarrhal state.

Mucous membranes

The Alumina patient suffers almost constantly from dryness of mucous membranes, the nose is dry, stuffed up, especially in one side, commonly the left.

Nose feels full of sticks, dry membranes or crusts, old atrophic catarrh crusts in the posterior nares and in the fossa of Rosenmuller.

Large green, offensive crusts all through the nose. Now comes the relation to the headache. Every time he catches cold the thick yellow discharge slacks up and gives way to a watery discharge and be has pain in the forehead over the eyes, going through the head, with nausea and vomiting.

So when it says headache from chronic catarrh that is what it means. The headache > lying down. He has sick headaches and periodical headaches.

You will see that Alumina corresponds to a constitution that may be called psoric-old, broken-down, feeble constitutions, scrofulous constitutions, such as are inclined to tubercles and catarrhal affections.

The catarrhal tendency of this remedy is marked. Catarrhs are found wherever mucous membranes exist. Alumina affects the skin and mucous membrane extensively, i. e., the external and internal skin, the surfaces of the body.

The patient is always expectorating, he blows the nose much and has discharges from the eyes. There is much disturbance of vision belonging to this catarrhal state that may be spoken of now.

Dimness of vision, as if looking through a fog sometimes described as through a veil. A misty dimness of vision.

There is also disturbance of the muscles of the eye, of the muscles of the ball and of the ciliary muscle. Weak and changeable vision. The paralytic weakness, such as belongs to the whole remedy, will be found in certain muscles, or sets of muscles, so that it is with great difficulty that glasses can be adjusted. The activity of the eye muscles is disturbed.

Naso pharynx

The catarrhal state extends over into the back of the nose and the posterior nares are filled up with tough mucus and crusts, and on looking into the throat you will see that the soft palate and the mucous membrane of the tonsils and pharynx and all parts that can be seen are in a state of granulation, are swollen, congested and inflamed.

The pharynx feels dry and there is a chronic sensitiveness and soreness. When swallowing food there is stinging and sensation as if the throat were full of little sticks, especially after a moment's rest, better by moistening and swallowing. In the night air, after keeping still a while, there in an accumulation of ropy mucus.

This extends into the larynx with soreness in the larynx and chest and chronic dry, backing cough. The same catarrhal state proceeds down into the oesophagus, so that it becomes sensitive and clumsy. He swallows with difficulty.

The bolus goes down with an effort and he feels it all the way down. There is soreness and clumsiness, paresis and difficulty of swallowing.

This paralytic weakness reminds the patient that he must put on a little force in order to swallow and this swallowing is felt while the substance goes down as if the oesophagus was sensitive. It has a catarrhal state of the stomach, bowels and rectum so that with the soft and difficult stool there is often an accumulation of mucus.

There is also a catarrhal condition in the bladder, kidneys and urethra and an old gonorrhoea will be prolonged into a catarrhal or gleety discharge.

Sometimes it is not a gleet, but the discharge remains for many months and instead of its being a light milky white, such as is natural in most prolonged cases of gonorrhoea, it remains yellow and is painless. So it is with the vagina.

The mucous discharge from the vagina is thick yellowish-white discharge, sometimes excoriating. Thus we see, in the constitution we have described, that an extensive catarrhal state belongs to the remedy.

Skin

When we come to the skin we find that it takes on a similar state of affairs. The patient is subject to all sorts of eruptions. The skin withers, becomes dry and is subject to eruptions, thickening, indurations, ulcerations, cracking and bleeding.

The eruptions itch worse in the warmth of the bed. The skin itches, even when there is no eruption, when becoming warm in bed, so that he scratches until the skin bleeds. This presents an idea as to eruptions that you will have to consider. A patient comes to you covered with crusts, and he says:

"When I get warm at night I have to scratch, and I scratch until the skin bleeds."

Now in Alumina it is very important to find out whether these crusts were produced by the scratching or whether the eruption, came out as an itching eruption, for in Alumina in the beginning there is no eruption, but he scratches until the skin is off and then come the crusts.

You must here prescribe not for the eruption, but for the itching of the skin without eruption. Now in Mezereum, Arsenicum, Dolichos and Alumina the skin itches and he scratches until it bleeds, and then he gets relief.

Of course after this there is an apparent eruption because crusts form. As soon as the healing begins the itching begins, and he is only relieved when the skin is raw. With the bleeding moisture of the skin there is relief of the itching.

Now some of the books do not make the distinction between itching without eruption and itching with eruption, and hence mostly all young, doctors get to thinking that itching of the skin must always be associated with eruption, and make a mistake in figuring out what kind of an eruption it is.

The skin thickens and indurates and ulcerates, and there are indurations under the ulcers. There is a very sluggish condition of both mucous membrane and skin with a tendency to induration.

Thickening of the mucous membrane will be found anywhere; after the thickening come little ulcerations, and in the course of time indurations are formed at the base of the ulcers. The same thing is true of the skin. Dryness and burning through everything and may be said of all the mucous membranes and the skin in general.

Chronic granular lids. It we turn the eyelids down we will see that the mucous membrane is thickened. Sometimes this thickening or hypertrophy causes a turning out of the lids like ectropion.

"The eyelashes fall out;" that is in keeping with the general state.

The hairs all over the body fall out. Parts become entirely denuded of hair; the hair of the scalp falls out extensively. All sorts of sounds in the ears, buzzing, etc., and derangement of hearing; purulent otorrhoea.

"Point of nose cracked" is in keeping with the remedy.

Induration here and there so that it favors lupus and epithelioma in one who is subject to these swellings and eruptions.

Alumina and Alumen, like Ars., Lach., Sulph. and, Conium , are medicines that relate to these troubles. Some of these have made brilliant cures where there is infiltration.

Upon the skin of the face and other parts of the body there is crawling Itching especially when getting warm. Sensation of tension. Peculiar sensation about the face and other parts not covered by clothing, a sensation of dried white of egg on the face, of dried blood or cobweb on the face.

If you have ever been going through a place where there are cobwebs and a little cobweb has strung across your face you will know what a peculiar sensation of crawling it produces, and you cannot leave it alone until it is removed.

That sensation particularly belongs to Alumina, Borax, Bar. c.

Little, crawlings and creepings in the skin. Itching of the face. These symptoms are so irritating that the patient will sit and rub his face all the time.

You will think that he is nervous. He has the appearance of being nervous as he sits rubbing the back of his hands. It is well to find out whether he does this because he cannot keep his hands still or because of the itching. Because of this itching sensation in the face he carries the hand to the face as though to brush away something.

The skin along the shin bone is rough, ragged and itching. It has been said that dry weather and dry, cold weather increase the complaints of Alumina, and that wet weather sometimes ameliorates.

The febrile condition of this remedy is not at all marked. There is not much chill and not much fever, but the passive, slow, sluggish, chronic elements and chronic symptoms are the ones that prevail most markedly. In weak, broken-down cases there are some night sweats and sweating towards morning. Slight chill in morning. Chill with thirst.

A striking feature of the remedy is the chronic dryness of the skin. Sweat is rare and scant.

This is not especially suitable for this copious, exhaustive sweats. It is the very opposite of Calcarea, which sweats copiously, but this remedy, with spinal and paralytic affections, is tired out from exertion, very exhausted, but does not sweat.

Pile on the covers to make him sweat if you will, but he only gets hot and itching and does not sweat.

Scanty sweat. Entire inability to sweat. Chronic dryness of skin with fissures. The skin becomes worn and ragged and fissured from its dryness. Great dryness of the thick skin over the back of the hands, and in cold weather the hands become cold and discolored.

Throat

Perhaps I have not said as much as should be said about the throat.

"Ulcers in the fauces, spongy, secreting a yellowish brown, badly smelling pus."

It may be said that the patient is often a victim of chronic sore throat. There is this about Alumina, it has a special tendency to localize itself upon mucous membranes.

You will find in an Alumina subject bleeding from all mucous membranes. He has catarrh of the nose and red eyes, and his nose becomes stuffed up and he has many acute colds; very severe throat trouble.

Discharges from all of the orifices. It is not a medicine that would be selected for a cold settling in the throat, not a remedy for acute sore throat, but it is a deep acting anti psoric, and act for months.

Its greatest usefulness is as a remedy for taking cold.

In this respect it is like Sil., Graph. and Sulfur. It effects tissue changes, and it does this slowly, for it is a slow-acting medicine.

While the patient himself with these deep seated psoric affections feels better generally after the remedy, it will be months before his symptoms go away.

He may say: "I feel better, but my symptoms all appear to be here. I can eat better and sleep better."

Then it would be unwise to change the remedy. You need not expect to get immediate relief of the catarrhs and pains in the back and other symptoms for which you gave this remedy.

You may be satisfied if you get the results after many weeks. You will find the same thing in the paralytic weakness produced by Plumbum.

There is a new drug that is coming into use, the proving of which is very full and rich, and it is analogous to the symptoms of this remedy. It is Curare.

Curare

I wish we had a finer proving of it, but it is rich with a great many things similar to Alumina and Plumbum, and especially in the weakness of the hands and fingers of pianists.

An old player will say that after she has been playing-for some time her fingers slow down. The weakness seems to be in the extensors. Lack of ability to life the fingers; the lifting motion is lost.

Curare to a great extent overcomes that, causes quickness to that lifting power of the fingers. But this remedy also runs through in general way such paretic conditions; while Curare is especially related to a paralytic condition of the extensors more than the flexors, the paralysis in Alumina is of both flexors and extensors.

Alumina

This medicine is one of the few that have been found to be aggravated from starch, especially the starch of potatoes.

Aggravation from eating potatoes. It has indigestion, diarrhea, great flatulence, aggravation of the cough from eating potatoes.

It has also aggravation from salt, wine, vinegar, pepper and from spirituous drinks.

Alumina is a spinal remedy and aggravation from spirituous drinks is in keeping with some other spinal remedies.

You find it in Zincum. The Zincum patient cannot drink wine, for all of his complaints are aggravated by it.

This medicine is so sensitive and so easily overcome by a small amount of liquor that he is obliged to abandon it. He is not only intoxicated by it, but it aggravates his complaints.

Stomach and digestion

Now the digestion has practically given out in this medicine. He is subject to catarrh of the stomach, to ulceration of the stomach, to indigestion from the simplest food. Sour and bitter eructations.

Vomiting of food, mucus or bile. Nausea, vertigo, heartburn, much flatulence. Vomits mucus and water. Stomach is distended with gas. The liver is full. of suffering. Both hypochondria are full of misery, but especially the right.

When going over Alumen I called attention especially to its antidotal relation to Lead.

This remedy also will overcome the poisonous effects of lead and sensitiveness to lead. Colic and paralytic weakness in lead workers, painters and artists and in those who are so sensitive to lead that from using hair wash containing lead they are paralyzed.

Not many years ago the acetate of lead was commonly used by women for leucorrhoea, but it was found that so many were sensitive to it that it was abandoned, Alumina is the most prominent antidote to the affections which have come about through that sensitive state.

Fissures

There is so much under stool and rectum that belongs to the general state that there is scarcely anything left to be presented except some important particulars. As you might suppose, this remedy has fissures; you would naturally expect these when you consider what kind. of mucous membranes and tissues this patient manufactures. He suffers greatly from constipation, he does much straining, the mucous membrane is thickened and swollen, and hence we have a fissure.

When you see a remedy manufacturing and producing such a state upon the economy, growing that kind of mucous membrane that would favour fissures, you do not have to wait until you have cured a fissure with that remedy to find out if it will suit the case.

You do not have to resort to the repertory to see what this remedy has done in fissure. From your general knowledge of the medicine, you will see that it ought to cure the patient, as it produces such a condition of the mucus membrane and skin as would be naturally found in one who has a fissure.

The skin indurates and ulcerates and becomes clumsy and unhealthy and constipation is produced, and so, after studying the remedy in that way, you are not surprised if it cures a fissure.

You can also think over what other medicines have this state of the economy and see what other remedies you would expect to cure a fissure with.

If you look into the nature of Nitric acid, Causticum and Graphites, you will see why they have had a wonderful record for curing fissure. That is the way to study your Materia Medica; see what it does to the man himself, to his organs and tissues.

Bladder

"Frequent micturition."

"Urine voided while straining at stool, or cannot pass urine without such straining"

That is a high grade symptom, it is a peculiar symptom, and may be called a particular of first grade. He must strain at stool in order to empty the contents of the bladder.

"Urine smarting, corroding."

"Feeling of weakness in the bladder and genitals."

"Swelling and discharge of light yellow pus from urethra."

"Burning with discharge of urine.''

Male

The symptoms of the male sexual organs are characterized by weakness, impotency and nightly emissions; suitable when the sexual organs are worn out from abuse or over use.

There is fullness and enlargement of the prostate gland and various disturbances of the prostrate, with sensation of fullness in the perineum.

Unpleasant sensations and distress in the region of the prostate gland after coition. Complaints at the time of, or after ejaculation, or after an emission.

The sexual desire is diminished and sometimes entirely lost. Paralytic weakness or paresis of the sexual organs; a state that is in keeping with the whole remedy.

"Discharge of prostatic fluid during difficult stool."

"Painful erections at night."

Female

The female has a great deal of trouble that can be cured with this remedy, but her troubles are mostly catarrhal.

An instance of this is the leucorrhoea; copious, acrid or excoriating, yellow leucorrhoea; leucorrhoea so copious that it runs down the thighs, making the parts red and inflamed.

Ulceration about the os. The mucous membranes are weak and patulous and ulcerate easily. All the parts are in a state of weakness.

There is dragging down from the relaxed condition of the ligaments. Sensation of weight; the pelvic viscera feel heavy. The discharge, stringy, looking like white of egg, copious and acrid; transparent mucus.

" Leucorrhoea, corroding, profuse; running down to heels."

It is more noticeable in the day time, because these complaints are generally worse when walking or when standing, which is not really an important symptom, but a common condition.

After menstruation it takes the woman nearly until the next period to get straightened up. All her muscles are weak; there seems to be no tonicity about her. It is highly suitable to women drawing near the end of menstruation, about forty years of age; the menstrual period prostrates, the flow is scanty, yet prostrating; the sufferings are terrible and the patient is miserable at the menstrual period. After menses, exhausted in body and mind, is a strong feature of Alumina.

It is a suitable remedy again when the woman has a gonorrhoea which has been prolonged by palliation. She has been made comfortable by partly suitable remedies, but it seems that no remedy has been quite deep enough to root out the trouble, for it keeps coming back.

In a discharge that keeps returning, better for little while on Pulsatilla, and on this and that and the other thing, and even on Thuja, given more especially because it is gonorrhoea than because she is a sick woman.

The patient is tired and worn out, and when you come to look at the whole patient and you see the paretic condition, the continued return of the discharge that has been palliated by remedies, think of this medicine in both the male and female.

The discharge is a painless one in the male. The gonorrhoeal discharge has lasted a long time, going and coming, until now there is left but a few drops and it is painless.

The remedy has cured many of these old cases. Threatening chronic catarrh. The mucous membrane everywhere is in a congested state and is weak.

A pregnant woman has some trouble as well. A woman, who is not naturally a sufferer from constipation, when pregnant becomes constipated, with all the characterizing features of Alumina, i. e., the inactivity of the rectum, no expulsive force; she must use the abdominal muscles, must strain a long time.

Infant

Again, the infant has a similar kind of straining. You will see the new-born infant, or the infant on few months old, that will need Alumina.

It is a very common medicine for constipation in infants when you can find nothing else; the child will strain and strain and make every effort to press the stool out, and upon examining the stool it is found to be soft, and should have been expelled easily.

It has hoarseness and loss of voice and paralytic weakness of the larynx. That is not strange; it is only in keeping with the general state, the broken down constitution. He has a weak voice and, if a singer, he is capable of singing only a little while, only capable of slight exertion.

Everything is a burden. A paralytic condition of the vocal cords, which steadily increases to loss of voice.

Cough and Chest

The most striking things we come to now are the cough and chest troubles. There is expectoration in some of the coughs, but the cough is usually a constant, dry, hacking cough one of those troublesome lingering coughs that has existed for years.

It competes with Arg. met. in its character of the dry, hacking cough, especially associated with weakness, but Arg. met. has the cough in the day time, which is not so in Alumina.

The Alumina cough is in the morning. Here is a symptom that about covers the Alumina cough:

"Cough soon after waking in the morning."

Every morning, a long attack of dry cough. The cough is hard, a continued dry hacking, and she coughs until she loses her breath and vomits, and loses the urine.

This symptom commonly occurs in the woman.

"Dry, hacking cough with frequent sneezing."

It says in the text "from elongated uvula," but it should read "from sensation of elongated uvula."

It is a sensation as if there were something tickling the throat; a tickling as if the uvula were hanging down a long distance, and he will tell you that his palate must be too long.

Another expression which is the same thing is "cough from sensation as of loose skin hanging in throat."

Some times those who do not know about the palate will talk of something loose in the throat, while those who know they have an uvula will generally call it the palate. But it is the same idea. Tickling in the larynx, too.

Singers

This is always quoted in singers. We would think of Alumina when singers break down in the voice from paralysis or from overwork of the voice.

The voice lets down and becomes feeble, and, when taking cold, there starts up a peculiar kind of tickling.

Alumina is very useful in these cases. Arg. met. was the remedy used by the earlier homoeopaths for singers and talkers with much trembling and letting down of the voice before the value of Alumina was known in such conditions.

Let me tell you something here about Rhus, as I may not think of it again. Many old singers, after taking cold, have a weakness left in the voice, which they notice on beginning to sing.

On beginning to sing the voice is weak and husky, but after using it a little while it improves. Give Rhus to all these patients, prima donnas, lawyers, preachers, etc.

They must warm up the voice and then they are all right, but they say:

"If I go back into the green room and wait a little while, when I commence to sing again I am worse than ever."

The voice is better if they stay in a very hot room and keep it in use. This fits into the general state of Rhus.

Hoarseness

There is a kind of hoarseness that you may discover to be a little different from the paralytic hoarseness of Alumina and Arg. met.

This hoarseness of which I speak belongs to this same class of people; on first beginning to use the voice it seems that they must get rid of some mucus by clearing the throat until the voice can get to work.

The vocal cords on beginning to work are covered with mucus and on getting rid of it they can do very good work, so long as they keep at it.

That is Phosphorus. In such cases the use of the voice becomes painful. The vocal cords are painful after motion and the larynx is painful to touch.

Some times this is so marked that it is like stabbing with a knife on trying to use the voice. So we must individualize hoarseness very extensively.

Homoeopathy is a matter of discrimination. Soreness of the chest which is much increased by talking. There is weakness of the muscular power of the chest. The lungs seem weak and the chest has a sensation of weakness in it. Jar increases the misery of the chest.

Back and limbs

The next most striking features will be in connection with the back and limbs, and I have spoken of these in general way.

Burning in the spine; much pain in the back. Burning and stitching pains in the back. He expresses it as follows:

"Pain in the back, as if a hot iron was thrust through lower vertebrae."

In myelitis this medicine does wonderful work when there is a considerable amount of spasmodic condition of the back as well, showing that the membranes are involved.

Another thing that belongs to this remedy that is a well known state in myelitis is the hoop sensation; sensation of bandages here and there about the limbs and body is a common symptom.

A sensation of a tight cord around the body characteristic of the most marked state of irritation and myelitis. Irritation of the spinal cord with sensitive places.

Burning places as if a hot iron were forced into the spine. Pain along the cord, rending, tearing pains in the cord with paralytic weakness, increasing paralysis and complete paralysis; paralysis of one side of the body.

"Pain in sole of foot on stepping, as though it were too soft and swollen."

"Numbness of heel when stepping."

"Trembling of knees," this is a mere matter of the general weakness.

"Limbs go to sleep when sitting."

Whenever the limb is pressed again anything it will go to sleep. Feeble circulation, feeble conductivity, feeble nerve action; everything is slowed down.

Arms and legs feel heavy.

"Pains in limbs as if bones were squeezed narrower, with pressure in the joints."

Now I will read some of the nerve symptoms which will corroborate some of the things we have gone over.

"Want of bodily irritability."

"Great exhaustion of strength, especially after walking in open air."

"One-sided paralysis, especially of the extensors."

"Rheumatic and traumatic paralysis in gouty patients."

Gouty patients with nodules in the joints; old broken down constitutions with paretic exhaustion.

"Excited condition of mind and body."

Tremblings here and there in the body.

"Slow, tottering gait as after severe illness."

He must make slow motions, he cannot hurry.

"Involuntary motions."

Sleep and dreams

There are all sorts of dreams and disturbances in sleep, so that the sleep may be quite disturbed and restless.

Unrefreshing sleep, waking up with palpitation of the heart.

"Many dreams and frequent awaking; starts in affright; muttering or crying."

"During sleep cervical muscles drew head backward;"

this is in cases of paralytic weakness; has to wake up as the muscles of the back of the neck pull so. Jerks in the back of the neck during sleep.

Running through the remedy very often, there is a great lack of animal heat, coldness, and yet the patient wants to be in the open air; must be well clothed open and kept warm, but wants to be in the open air.

The patient takes cold continually from every change and draft. Sometimes the patient will go to bed as cold as a frog, and when warm in bed is so disturbed by itching and the warmth of the bed that there is no comfort.

These are two extremes coming together. The circulation is so feeble over the extremities and backs of the hands that in cold weather the hands are constantly cold and covered with cracks and fissures that bleed.

Weakness

This medicine, like Alumina, seems to produce a peculiar kind of Paralytic weakness of the muscles in all parts of the body, a sort of lack of tone.

The extremities are weak. This weakness is felt especially in the rectum and bladder. The stool becomes impacted from want of ability of the rectum and colon to expel their contents.

The bladder is also slowed down in its action, and it is with great difficulty that the urine is voided. After urinating, the bladder often remains half full. The urine is very slow to start, and when the patient stands to urinate the urine falls down perpendicularly, as in Hepar. From this we see the sluggish action. The paralytic condition extends also to the veins producing a vaso-motor paralysis.

Induration

Another peculiar condition running through the remedy is the tendency to induration wherever there is an inflamed surface.

All remedies that have this in their nature relate more or less to cancerous affections, because in cancer we have as the most natural feature a tendency to induration.

Ulcers are common in Alumen, and this induration underlies the ulcer; ulcers with indurated base. Or little scales may appear upon the skin where the circulation is feeble, over cartilaginous portions for instance and a great thick indurated mass forms.

Infiltration takes place under this crust, the crust keeps coming off, and a lack of healing follows because of the weakness of the tissues from a vaso-motor paralysis.

Epithelioma is scarcely more than that, and so we have in this remedy features like epithelioma and other cancerous affections. What is the scirrhus but a peculiar form of induration?

When the economy takes on a low type of life, a low form of tissue making, and the tissues inflame and upon the slightest provocation indurate we can see that this is a kind of constitution that is predisposed to deep-seated troubles, to phthisis, Bright’s disease, diabetes, cancer, etc.

We are on the border line of ultimates and something Is going to happen. This remedy leads the economy into such a state of disorder, a low type of tissue making is found, and many of these indurations will have cancer as an ultimate. This is a long acting antipsoric remedy.

Glands

There is also in this medicine a tendency to induration of the neck of the uterus and the mammary glands.

Glands become slowly inflamed, and do not stop with ordinary congestion and hardness, but become as hard as bullets.

This induration extends to the various glands of the body, but is especially noticeable in the tonsils.

For those who have a tendency to colds which settle in the throat, especially singling out the tonsils and indurating these; those who keep on taking cold and the tonsils keep on growing, and indurating, we have in Alumen a medicine that fits the whole process, the hardening and infiltration, and it cures these cases according to the law of similars, when the symptoms agree.

It cures young children growing up with enormously enlarged and very hard tonsils in whom every cold settles in the throat.

Alumen is one of Baryta carb., which has the same tendency. In one patient there will be one kind of constitution, and, after thoroughly examining it, looks like Baryta carb.

You may have a different constitution in another patient, and, after carefully examining it, see that it looks like Alumen; another you will see is Sulphur; another, if you look into it carefully, you find is Calcarea carb., and another, Calcarea iod., and so on among those remedies capable of bringing about the conditions described.

If we can find symptoms which picture the constitutional state we have no trouble. When the symptoms have been well gathered the case is as good as cured; it is easy then to find a remedy.

Partially proved

This remedy is imperfect from the fact that it is only partially proved. I do not care to dwell upon partially proved remedies, but when they have a number of striking features that fit into everyday life it is important to know them. The mental symptoms of this remedy are very few.

The remedy should be proved in the higher potencies upon sensitive persons in order that the mental state may be brought out.

Head

Some of the symptoms of the head are very striking and valuable. Pain on the top of the head with burning. The pain is a sensation as if a weight were pressing down into the skull. You will see a woman in bed with her hand on top of the head and she will say:

"Doctor, it burns right there like fire, and it presses as if my skull would be crushed in, and the only relief I get from pressing hard upon it an from an ice cold cloth pressed upon it."

She wants the cloth changed and made cold every few minutes. It is a queer thing that a pressing pain is made better from pressing upon the part. This is like Cactus , pressing pain on vertex relieved from pressure.

The rubric of remedies with that symptom is very small, and hence this remedy fills a place.

There are some strange, rare and peculiar symptoms for which paucity of remedies, and we have to work in other channels and along sidetracks in getting the constitutional state of the patient.

Alumen cured the pressing pain on the vertex in one patient in whom it alternated with the most troublesome chronic, irritable bladder.

" Vertigo: lying on his back, with weakness in pit of stomach; > opening eyes; > turning on right side."

Heart

There is another feature, however, in this remedy, the palpitation is brought on from lying on the right side.

It would strike anyone as something very singular, because palpitation is generally worse lying on the left side.

A heart that is fluttering, enlarged or disordered is generally worse while lying on the left, as the heart has less room then, but it is strange, rare and unique when these symptoms are worse lying on the right side.

When this condition is present in a patient it is necessary to find a remedy having just exactly that symptom, and very often it will be seen that the rest of the symptoms of the case fit into the remedy that has produced this peculiar state.

There is one more feature that you must add to these things, viz.: slowness and sluggishness of the muscles throughout the body, a slowing down of all the muscles, a sense of weakness in the arms and legs.

Stools and rectum

In the constipation there may be some urging to stool without result or he may go several days without desire. There is no ability to expel the stool. He will strain a long time with no success, and finally after many days the stool is passed and is an agglomeration of hard balls, large masses of little bard balls like marbles all fastened together.

This is a very strong feature in an Alumen constitution.

"Stool: less frequent, dryer and harder; large black, hard or in small pieces like sheep's dung; no relief afterwards."

After stool there is a sensation as if the rectum were yet full. This peculiar feature comes with the weakness or paresis of the rectum, i. e., the rectum is not strong enough to expel all of its contents, and hence the sensation of unfinished stool.

In the rectum there is ulceration with bleeding from the ulcers. The hemorrhoids ulcerate and they are very painful, so that after every stool he has prolonged suffering, a dull aching pain in the rectum.

Catarrhal conditions prevail throughout the remedy.

In old scrofulous, psoric patients, who are subject to chronic yellow bland discharges from the eyes, with enlarged veins; chronic yellow discharges from the vagina and from the urethra in the male; chronic painless gonorrhoea.

In addition to the catarrhal discharges there is a tendency to ulceration, so that there are little ulcerative patches in the vagina, little aphthous patches in the vagina and on the cervix of the uterus.

When a patient is suffering from a chronic gonorrhoea, instead of the discharge becoming white as in a gleet if remains yellow, and there are little indurations along the urethra, which the patient will call the physician’s attention to as "lumps".

Discharge with "little bunches" along the urethra. These are little ulcers, and beneath the ulcers are indurations.

When this state is present you have an Alumen gonorrhoea. In a little while the patient will have two or three strictures unless he gets this remedy, because these little ulcers will each end in stricture narrowing the canal. Another strange feature in the catarrhal states and in the ulcers is its tendency to affect the vessels.

The veins become varicose and bleed, so that there may be bleeding from any of the inflamed or catarrhal areas and bleeding from the ulcers.

There are many neuralgic pains about the head of a non descript character. These head pains come on in the morning on awaking.

Eyes

The eye symptoms are of an inflammatory or congestive character, with tendency to ulceration. Purulent ophthalmia; chronic sore eyes.

"Sees things double by candle light."

"Nasal polypus left side. Lupus or cancer on the nose. Face pale as a corpse, lips blue. Scirrhus of the tongue."

Mouth

See what a tendency it has to produce minute growths, little indurations and infiltrations. Bleeding from the teeth; the teeth decay and the gums recede from the teeth; the teeth become loose; scorbutic appearance of the gums.

"Mouth burning, ulcerated; grey, dirty, spongy skin about a tooth, which is surrounded with proud flesh; offensive saliva."

In the mouth we have the same general feature of ulceration, with dryness of the mouth, dry tongue and throat, and great thirst for ice cold water.

"Uvula inflamed and enlarged. Predisposed to tonsillitis."

"Vomits everything he eats."

After that you can put the word "ulcer," because it especially refers to that state of congestion, where there is easy ulceration.

Abdomen

Under abdomen we find flatulence.

The intestines do not perform their work, they take on spasmodic action, and consequently the patient suffers from cramps and colicky pains; boring, rending, tearing pains.

Retraction of the abdomen and drawing in of the navel. If you will compare Lead in its poisonous effects upon those who work in white lead you will see quite a counterpart of this remedy, and you will not be surprised to observe that Plumbum and this remedy antidote each other.

They do so because they are so similar, they cannot live in the same house. Alumen is a great remedy to overcome lead colic in those who work in lead; it removes the susceptibility.

There are many painters who have to give up their occupation on account of this susceptibility.

Alumen will often overcome this tendency and enable them to go back to their business. Etc,

Female: In the female we note

"weight of uterus presses down collum; granulations of vagina; leucorrhoea copious; emaciation; yellow complexion; indurations of uterus, even scirrhus; ulcers of uterus."

Sometimes you get evidence of this vaginal state by the woman saying that coition is so painful that it becomes impossible; it is not to be wondered at that the natural act cannot be performed when so much trouble is present.

Larynx and Chest

"Voice entirely lost."

Chronic loss of the voice from a low state of the economy and from always taking fresh colds. Expectoration of much yellow mucus; scraping of the throat all the time to get rid of a little accumulation of yellow mucus.

"Dry cough in evening after lying down."

"Chronic morning cough."

Cough is not a very important thing in this remedy; it is the general state of the economy that is to be looked at. The cough will not interpret the nature of the disease to the physician, because when these little ulcers are present they must cause some kind of a cough. This patient may go into phthisis or be affected with any of the ultimates of disease.

Alumen has been very useful in the treatment of old people who morning expectoration, catarrh of the chest, suffer from copious, ropy, haemoptysis and great weakness of the chest, so that it is difficult to expel the mucus. In this it is similar to Antimonium tartaricum.

The Therapeutics of Fevers

H. C. Allen · The Therapeutics of Fevers · 1902 Library of Congress printing (Allen d. 1909; public domain)

Characteristic

**Adapted to spare, dry, thin subjects of scrofulous habit, who suffer from chronic diseases; dark complexion; anxious, mild, tearful disposition; constitutions with lack of vital heat; old people; hypochondriacs.

Dry, tettery, itching eruption, worse in winter (Petr.); intolerable itching of whole body when getting warm in bed (Psor., Sul.); scratches until it bleeds, which then becomes painful.

Time passes too slowly; an hour seems half a day (Can. I.).

Inability to walk, except with the eyes open, and in the daytime; tottering and falling when closing eyes (Arg. n., Gels.).

Abnormal appetite; craving for starch, chalk, charcoal, cloves, coffee or tea-grounds, acids, and indigestible things (Cic., Psor.); potatoes disagree; cause colic.

Chronic eructations for years; worse in evening.

All irritating things—salt, wine, vinegar, pepper—immediately produce cough.

Constipation: no desire for, and no ability to pass stool until there is a large accumulation (Melil.); with great straining, must grasp the seat of closet tightly; stools hard, knotty, covered with mucus; or soft, clayey, adhering to parts (Plat.); of nursing infants, from artificial food; inactive rectum, even soft stool requires great straining (Anac., Plat., San., Sil., Ver.); of old people (Lyc., Op.); of pregnancy (Sep.).

Urine voided while straining at stool, or cannot pass it without such straining.

After menses; exhausted mentally and physically (Carb. an., Coc.).

Leucorrhœa; acrid, profuse, running down to heels in large quantities (Lyc., Lys., Onos., Syph.); > by cold bathing; < during the day.

Aggravation

Generally in cold air; out-doors; on alternate days; while sitting; eating potatoes, soups; at new and full moon.

Amelioration

-Generally in warmth; in mild weather; walking; while eating (Psor.); in wet weather (Caust., Nux, Lach., Sulph.).

Alumina is the chronic of Bryonia.

Relations

Complementary to Bryonia. Follows Bry. well.

Type

Tertian. Chronic; relapsing. No regularity.

Time

Chilliness at 4 P. M., lasting till evening. Evening paroxysm from 5 to 8 P. M.

Chill

With great thirst; with nausea (Arn., Caps., Ign.). Internally cold and chilly, with desire for warmth of stove without relief from heat (Lach.—relieved by heat of stove, Ign.), and stretching and bending of the limbs; worse after warm drinks, and after eating warm soup (after cold drinks, Ars., Caps., Eup. perf.). Chilliness of whole body, feet cold as ice the whole day, with heat of head, external chilliness and external heat, especially dark redness of the cheeks. Frequent repetition of chills in the evening, every other day. Chills near the warm stove. Violent chilliness in evening, especially feet and back, that could not get warm near stove. Chilly during the day, heat all night (chill lasting 12 hours, Canth.). Chill increased by slightest motion (Acon., Bry.—increased by uncovering, Amm., Nux, Sep.).

With thirst and nausea, $<$ by least motion, warm drinks, warm soup.

Heat

Without thirst; heat, with anxiety at night, and sweat. Heat in evening beginning in and spreading from face and head, frequently only of right side of body. Heat $<$ by motion (Bry.—$>$ by motion, Caps.).

Without thirst; often only right-sided; < by motion; with sweat.

Sweat

At night, in bed, toward morning; most profuse in face, often only on right side of face (Nux, Puls.). Sweat upon every motion (Bry., Sep.), followed by cold shivers as if taking cold. Sometimes entire inability to sweat (Hep.).

< by motion; of right side of face.

Tongue

Clean. Appetite good. Longing for fruit and vegetables. Longing for indigestible things. Aversion to meat (Arn.).

Apyrexia

Continual empty eructations which afford relief. Great lassitude of the whole body; great exhaustion and inclination to lie down; unconquerable disposition to lie down.

If patient has had frequent attacks of painter's colic. Rarely indicated, but when acquired, chronic constitutional ailments will almost always be present. Often completes a cure begun by Bryonia, and should always be thought of as the next remedy if symptoms correspond.

Analysis

The constitutional symptoms of this anti-psoric remedy are guiding. In fever accompanying myelitis or other diseases of the cord.