Vipera vip.

VEINS. Blood.

LETTING LIMB HANG DOWN. Cold. Yearly. Touch.

Bursting feeling. Hæmorrhagic tendency.

Epistaxis. Excruciating pain at epigastrium. Enlarged liver. Fulness and unbearable pain, as if limb would burst; must elevate parts; sits with feet high. Cramps in or blue lower limbs. Varicose veins or ulcers. Phlebitis. Goitre.

Related: Elap.

The German Viper (VIPERA)

Viper poisoning causes a temporary increase in reflexes, paresis supervenes, a paraplegia of the lower extremities extending upwards. Resembles acute ascending paralysis of Landry (Wells). Has special action on kidneys and induces hæmaturia. Cardiac dropsy.

Indicated in inflammation of veins with great swelling; bursting sensation. Enlargement of liver. Ailments of menopause. Œdema of glottis. Poly-neuritis, polio-myelitis.

Excessively swollen. Lips and tongue swollen, livid, protruding. Tongue dry, brown, black. Speech difficult.

Violent pain in enlarged liver, with jaundice and fever; extends to shoulder and hip.

Patient is obliged to keep the extremities elevated. When they are allowed to hang down, it seems as if they would burst, and the pain is unbearable (Diad). Varicose veins and acute phlebitis. Veins swollen, sensitive; bursting pain. Severe cramps in lower extremities.

Livid. Skin peels in large plates. Lymphangioma, boils, carbuncles, with bursting sensation, relieved by elevating parts.

Pelius berus-Adder (Prostration and fainting, faltering pulse, skin yellow, pain about navel. Swelling of arm, tongue, right eye; giddiness, nervousness, faintness, sickness, compression of chest, could not breathe properly or take a deep breath; aching and stiffness of limbs, joints stiff, collapsed feeling, great thirst). Eel serum (heart and kidney diseases. Failure of compensation and impending asystole).

Twelfth potency.

Vipera communis. Pelias berus. Common Viper [with other varieties, especially V. redi (Italian Viper) and V. torva (German Viper)]. N. O. Ophidia (Family, Viperidæ). Attenuations of the venom.

Epistaxis. Goître. Hæmorrhages. Jaundice. Liver, enlargement of. Neurasthenia. Phlebitis. Senility, premature. Tongue, swelling of. Varicosis.

The effects of bites by the Common Viper and related species have been collected, and have furnished the data for Homœopathic prescribing. Vipera affects the blood and blood-vessels, conducing to hæmorrhage and inflammation of the vessels themselves. A keynote for Vip . in cases of phlebitis and varicosis is " < on letting the limb affected hang down"; as if it would burst with fulness. The region of the vessel affected is inflamed and sensitive. Allen ( Handbook ) relates this case: A goldbeater found the veins of his right arm become exceedingly swollen and painful, so that he could no longer work, or let his hand hang down. Vip . cured immediately. A case (quoted from Med. Adv . in Med. Cent ., ii. 79) of varicose vein of the popliteal space, with the sensation as though the leg would burst , and a nervous, fidgety condition of the feet which kept them in constant motion, was cured with Vip. torva 30. The bursting feeling appears to be at the root of this characteristic. Swan said Vip . was a remedy for all forms of epistaxis. Vip . has a chronic and periodic action; the symptoms return annually for years. Patients resist the cold badly. The parts may be paralysed and ulcers and gangrene follow. A Sensation as if something ran up the thigh occurred in the bitten limb in one case. In one case there was sweat over the whole body except the bitten limb . Leonard ( M. A ., xxvi. 103) gave Vipera acontica carinata ( 1 ) to a lady suffering from climacteric hæmorrhage; flow red with dark clots; excessive to prostration and faintness. She had a small uterine fibroid. A few doses relieved, and the excessive hæmorrhage did not return. ( 2 ) A lady nursing a child a year old was much prostrated by hæmorrhage lasting several weeks, not profuse, but continuous: Nose-bleed nearly every day; weaning brought no relief. Chi . 200 did no good. Vip. ac . cm cured in three doses. The symptoms are: < By touch; by pressure; on change of weather. < Letting limb or part hang down.

Compare: Hæmorrhage of fluid blood, Sanguisuga. < Hanging down limbs, Calc., Alm., Am. c., Sbi., Thu.

Delirium; and raving; with vomiting; alternating with sopor. — Coma, with thirst for water. — Loss of mental functions with drawn features.

Vertigo: with falling forward, with nose-bleed and anxiety; with nausea and vomiting, so that he fainted; with loss of vision. — Ecchymoses in membranes of brain, effusion of bloody serum into ventricles. — Tearing at every change of weather, with sticking. — Headache: with coated tongue and bad appetite; with inclination to sigh.

Eyes: dark yellow; red, inflamed, and watery; staring; sunken. — Pupils: dilated; l. dilated, r. contracted. — Paralysis of lids; dropped over eyes. — Vision: dim; dim in l. eye, lost in r.; lost.

Bleeding from nose; with vertigo.

Face: swollen (and neck), with pressing out of eyes; tense and blackish, with closure of throat; convulsed; red; pale and hippocratic, with cold sweat on forehead; covered with drops of sweat. — Lips: blue; lips and tongue swollen, covered with saliva and pale; livid and protruding. — Acid burning in lips, mouth, and throat.

Scorbutic line on gums. — Sensation of swelling in the teeth ( H. W ., xxviii. 25). — Swelling of salivary glands; of mouth; of mouth and throat, with dryness, so that swallowing was impossible. — Tongue: swollen; and brownish-black, protruding; so that he could not speak; with closed jaws and difficult speech. — Tongue: black; fuliginous and breath fetid; yellow, tip red; white, tremulous; white in middle, moist on edges, with thirst. — Speech: inarticulate; and thick; lost on account of weakness.

Swelling like a goître. — Closure of throat so that she could swallow only water and milk, afterwards biting in fauces, the swelling of which became blackish. — Viscid mucus adheres to pharynx.

Appetite lost. — Thirst: with moist tongue, for cold drinks.

Nausea: with shuddering; with attack of faintness. — Retching; with suffocative sensation. — Vomiting: after milk; of all food and drink; with weakness; faintness; shivering, and thirst; coldness of body; with colic; with colic and thirst; bilious diarrhœa of bitter yellow fluid; green substances; green liquid; viscid greenish fluid. — Pain: in epigastrium; < pressure; in epigastric or umbilical region. — Uneasiness in epigastrium. — Digestion slow.

Hypochondria tense; sore. — Abdomen tense, pressure causes distension of facial muscles. — Swelling with raging pains and spasms even to faintness, and after drinking milk vomiting of a mass of round worms, then freedom from worm troubles which he had before. — Sudden flatulent distension, with colic, pain in back, and vomiting. — Rumbling. — Pain in abdomen; in umbilical region, < pressure.

Diarrhœa: frequent; bilious. — Fetid; and black. — Bloody stools; in masses of dark, offensive blood (apparently from the tongue, which had been scarified). — Stools: copious; numerous, with shivering, urging, and thirst; involuntary; and frequent, mixed with blood and mucus; and involuntary micturition. — Discharge of black, coagulated blood; of blood just before death. — Pain and tenesmus. — Urging to pass stool and urine; desire for stool, with coldness to touch. — (After diarrhœa, greenish and bloody, most violent pain in the enlarged liver, with jaundice and fever, pain extending from liver to shoulder and down to hip; Vipera immediately removed the pain and reduced the liver to its normal size.)

Ineffectual desire. — Strangury. — Involuntary micturition. — Urine: increased; suppressed; dark yellow, as in jaundice.

Suffocation. — Dyspnœa; with sticking in heart. — Anxious breathing, as in croup, threatening asphyxia. — Breathing ceased suddenly, heart stopped, face became livid, &c., tracheotomy was performed, blood drawn from arm flowed scantily, was dark, mixed with bright streaks.

Veins of chest and abdomen thick and hard. — Swelling of chest as far as umbilicus after bite on face. — Œdema of lungs before death. — Pain: in l. side; over four or five r. ribs on pressure. — Oppression, with anxiety; with violent efforts to breathe and swallow.

Sticking in heart; with cold sweat and faintness. — Pain in heart with faintness. — Dragging pain so that he tears his clothes, becomes faint. — Anxiety at same time for four years, with soreness of the bitten foot and paralysis of r. arm. — Heart's action: slow; feeble; and no pulsation in radial or carotid arteries, but that in crural was very strong. — Pulse: rapid; interrupted; slow, febrile; irregular; weak. — ( Vip . is a very valuable remedy for varicose veins and for acute phlebitis, the vein is swollen, bordered by an area of inflammation, which is very sensitive to touch, but particularly with the sensation, on letting the leg hang down, as if it would burst from the fulness of the veins. — Phlebitis of r. arm, < hanging arms down.)

Sticking in kidneys. — Pain in loins.

Limbs swollen and red. — Livid spots on the bitten limb every year at the time of the bite. — Yellowish, livid, mottled spots. — Trembling. — Pain in limbs: < touch; alternating with pains in abdomen. — Limbs: benumbed: relaxed. — (Burning feeling in limbs in three cases — neurasthenia, an old sprain, and varicose veins.)

Pain: in shoulders; in arm, extending to chest. — Arm swollen; livid red; red, covered with spots; painful. — Paralysis of r. arm recurring for years after, a bite on foot. — Swelling: of the hand not bitten; of hand, not pitting on pressure, with pain as if it would burst, with pain on touch; and stiffness. — Hands violet-coloured, covered with phlyctenules. — Skin of hand dead and detached in large plates, subjacent tissues livid. — Stitches in finger-tips after bite on arm.

Shuffling gait caused by paralysis. — Convulsive movements. — Cramps. — Weakness. — Feeling as if something moved up along thigh (after bite on ankle). — Tension in knees and ankles. — Knees stiff. — Leg swollen, cold, and insensible. — Paralysis of foot with shuffling gait. — Paralysis, then ulcers.

Persons become prematurely old; the development of children is arrested. — Blood altered, tending to hæmorrhages, coagulability lost; blood black. — Symptoms periodic, return every year. — Persistent œdema with tendency to ulcers. — Faintness. — Reeling. — Prostration. — Collapse. — The bite was felt through the whole body like a streak of lightning, she sank to the ground. — Bitten part seat of violent pain. — The swelling was insensible.

Skin: pale; yellowish; jaundiced on face and trunk, with red patches on limbs; livid; in spots; black petechial spots over whole body, which was cold to touch. — Herpetic eruption, with itching about the wound. — Roseola-like eruption on inside of arm and down side of body. — Ulcers. — Blisters about the bite, bursting and leaving ulceration, muscles were laid bare, were dark red, dry, looked like smoked meat, insensible to touch, the sore was offensive. — Gangrene. — Crawling in soles, then also in palms.

Disposed to yawn. — Sleepiness; and heaviness; with inability to sleep, and also almost constant necessity to change the position. — Sleeplessness; from pain. — Night restless.

Chilliness: with sweat; with cold sweat; with rigidity and clammy sweat; then fever. — Temperature diminished, resists cold badly. — Heat: in morning, with thirst, restlessness, and moderate pains; towards evening; at night, with delirium; then shivering. — Fever of irregular type; intermittent fever. — Burning: running up arm; rising from heel to tongue; on chest and abdomen, with longing for cold applications though skin was cold to touch; of fingers (from rubbing a stick with which a snake had been bruised), with swelling. — Sweat: after vomiting; after chamomile tea, copious sweat from abdomen to toes except over the bitten limb; cold; cold, clammy. — Skin dry.

The fresh poison of the German viper (adder) is triturated with sugar of milk.

Compare other serpent venoms.

Œdema; with coma. ▶ Swelling, agg. lips and eyelids; of whole right side of body; of lymphatics extending from the bite, with inflammation; with insensibility. ▶ Bitten part swollen; with blackness, hardness and spots; with inflammation; with œdema, redness and heat, parts hard and tender, with tensive pain; with pain, then numbness and rigidity, afterwards suppuration successively of finger, forearm and axilla; and of mouth and abdomen (he sucked the wound), with general weakness, hands black and cold, bloody vomiting and diarrhœa. ▶ Swelling of face after bit on cheek, parts about the bit livid, next day diffuse cellular inflammation extended from the would to neck and sternum and opposite side of face.

Swelling of bitten tongue, he fell to the ground in asphyxia, respiration and pulse stopped, face purple, the circumference of neck exceeded that of head; tongue blue, immovable, protruding, with constant dribbling of saliva, S. of submaxillary and parotid glands, gasping of air, pallor, anxious expression; and vessels on under surface gorged with blood, face pale, cold sweat on forehead, pulse quick and irregular, bloody salivation, T. felt benumbed, later it appeared almost square, under surface nearly black, inability to articulate, difficulty in swallowing, the S. extended to right nipple and had a crackling or emphysematous feel, as if air were extravasated in cellular membrane.

Swelling of the bitten limb; with darkness; with dark redness; covered with phlyctænules; with ecchymoses; and at the place of the bit ulcers exuding sanious liquid; at anniversary of the bite, with development of spots and malaise; like phlegmonous erysipelas, with ecchymoses around the bite; doughy, temperature elevated, cutaneous veins looked like red stripes, pain on motion; painful œdema every year at the first hot whether, with colic and retching, digestion disturbed, somnolence, gums fungoid, skin icteric, chilliness, physical and intellectual weariness.

Swelling of arm, shoulder, chest and back of side bitten, with inflammation; S. of hand, arm and right side of trunk, with pain causing repeated fainting; of the bitten arm, almost purple, with anxiety, headache, vomiting and shivering, in a few hours bulla on a red base over the wound, afterwards similar bullæ all over body, even on face, the intermediate spaces red and swollen, when ruptured much turbid serum escaped, the eruption lasted from May to November, every May afterwards lassitude, anxiety, nausea, headache, etc., then after six or eight days the white cicatrix became red and painful, then tingling and swelling of arm, then bullæ lasting five or six weeks.

Swelling of arm and hand, gradually extended over chest, with nausea and vomiting, arm hot, livid, covered with black and dark red spots, skin tense, the livid red color amel. pressure, but the spots of ecchymoses were not affected thereby, at the bite phlyctenular blisters with reddish scrum, also phlyctenulæ on back of hand, cephalalgia, vertigo, rapid pulse, pale tongue, hand began to diminish in size, but shoulder was large, covered with black mottled spots, left scapular region and part of right livid red, with spots of ecchymoses, the redness and spots extended over anterior part of chest, right breast œdematous, hard and ecchymosed (the trouble in breast was apparently caused by a blow), afterwards the ecchymoses and infiltration spread over nates, sclerotica yellow.

Continue in Allen 46 more passages →

Swelling, with sensation of heaviness, as if the limb would drop off; seems to be quite characteristic of this drug.
It is particularly indicated in inflammation of the veins, with very great swelling, sensitiveness to touch, but particularly with a sensation as if it would burst from the distention of the veins, greatly < letting the limb hang down.
In one case following a diarrhœa, there were violent pains in the liver, involving the right shoulder and hip, with enlargement of the liver, quickly cured.