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Chronic Diseases-- Samuel Hahnemann |
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(Page 70 ... 79) Intolerable1 pain in the skin (or in the muscles, or in the periosteum) of some part of the body from a slight movement of the same or of a more distant part; e.g., from writing there arises a pain in the shoulder or in the side of the neck, etc., while sawing or performing other hard labor with the same hand causes no pain; a similar pain in the adjacent parts, from speaking and moving the mouth; pain in the lips and in the back at a slight touch. Numbness of the skin or of the muscles of certain parts and limbs.2 Dying off of certain fingers or of the hands or feet.3 Crawling or also prickling formication (as from the limbs going to sleep) in the arms, in the legs and in other parts (even in the fingertips). A crawling, or whirling, or an internally itching restlessness, especially in the lower limbs (in the evening in bed or early on awaking); they must be brought into another position every moment. Painful sensation of cold in various parts. Burning pains in various parts (frequently without any change in the usual external bodily temperature). Coldness, repeated or constant of the whole body, or of the one side of the body; so also of single parts, cold hands, cold feet which frequently will not get warm in bed. Chilliness, constant, even without any change in the external bodily temperature. Frequent flushes of heat, especially in the face, more frequently with redness than without; sudden, violent sensation of heat during rest, or in slight motion, sometimes even from speaking, with or without perspiration breaking out. Warm air in the room or at church is exceedingly repugnant to her, makes her restless, causes her to move about (at times with a pressure in the head, over the eyes, not infrequently alleviated by epistaxis). ----- (1 Of incredible variety. Often burning, jerking, lancinating, but often also indescribable, are these pains which communicate a similar intolerable excessive sensitiveness to the mind. These pains thus affect chiefly the upper parts of the body, or the face (tic douloureux), or the skin of the neck, etc., at even a gentle touch, in speaking and chewing, - in the shoulder at a, slight pressure, or movement of the finger.) (2 The sense of touch is lacking; the parts feel hard and tumid, either periodically or permanently (constant insensibility). (3 The limb than becomes white, bloodless, without feeling and quite cold, often for hours, especially while it is cool (stroking with a piece of zinc toward the tips the fingers or the toes usually drives it away quickly, but only as a palliative.) Rushes of blood, also at times a sensation of throbbing in all the arteries (while he often looks quite pale, with a feeling of prostration throughout the body). Rush of blood to the head. Rush of blood to the chest. Varices, varicose veins in the lower limbs (varices on the pudenda), also on the arms (even with men), often with tearing pains in them (during storms), or with itching in the varices.1 Erysipelas, partly in the face (with fever), partly on the limbs, on the breast while nursing, especially in a sore place (with a prickling and burning pain). Whitlow, paronychia (sore finger, with festering skin). Chilblains (even when it is not winter) on the toes and fingers, itching, burning and lancinating pains. Corns, which even without external pressure cause burning, lancinating pains. Boils (furuncles), returning from time to time, especially on the nates, the thighs, the upper arms and the body. Touching them causes fine stitches in them. Ulcers on the thighs, especially, also upon the ankles and above them and on the lower part of the calves, with itching, gnawing, tickling around the borders, and a gnawing pain as from salt on the base of the ulcer itself; the parts surrounding are of brown and bluish color, with varices near the ulcers, which, during storms and rains, often cause tearing pains, especially at night, often accompanied with erysipelas after vexation or fright, or attended with cramps in the calves. Tumefaction and suppuration of the humerus, the femur, the patella, also of the bones of the fingers and toes (spina ventosa). Thickening and stiffening of the joints. Eruptions, either arising from time to time and passing away again; some voluptuously itching pustules, especially on the fingers or other parts, which, after scratching, burn and have the greatest similarity to the original itch-eruption; or nettle-rash, like stings and water-blisters, mostly with burning pain; or pimples without pain in the face, the chest, the back, the arms and the thighs; or herpes in fine miliary grains, closely pressed together into round, larger or smaller spots of mostly reddish color, sometimes dry, sometimes moist, with itching, similar to the eruption of itch and with burning after rubbing them. They continually extend further to the circumference with redness, while the middle seems to become free from the eruption and covered with smooth, shining skin (herpes circinatus). The moist herpes on the legs are called salt-rheum; or crusts raised above the surrounding skin, round in form, with deep-red painless borders, with frequent violent stitches on the parts of the skin not yet affected; or small, round spots on the skin, covered with bran-like, dry scales, which often peel off and are again renewed without sensation; or red spots of the skin, which feel dry, with burning pain; somewhat raised above the rest of the skin. ----- (1 The swellings of the arteries (aneurismata) seem to have no other origin than in the psora.) Freckles, small and round, brown or brownish spots in the face, on the hands and on the chest, without sensation. Liver spots, large brownish spots which often cover whole limbs, the arms, the neck, the chest, etc., without sensation or with itching. Yellowness of the skin, yellow spots of a like nature around the eyes, the mouth, on the neck, etc., without sensibility.1 Warts on the face, the lower arm, the hands, etc.2 Encysted tumors in the skin, the cellular tissue beneath it, or in the bursae mucosae of the tendons (exostosis), of various forms and sizes, cold without sensibility.3 Glandular swellings around the neck, in the groin, in the bend of the joints, the bend of the elbow, of the knee, in the axillae,4 also in the breasts. Dryness of the (scarf) skin either on the whole body with inability to perspire through motion and heat, or only in some parts.5 ----- (1 After riding in a carriage, yellowness of the skin comes on most quickly, if it is not yet constant but only occasional.) (2 Especially in youth. Many remain only a short time and pass away to give place to another symptom of psora.) (3 The fungus hematodes, which has lately become such a dreadful plague, has, according to the conclusions I am compelled to draw from several cases, no other source than psora.) (4 At times they pass over, after lancinating pains, into a sort of chronic suppuration, in which, however, instead of pus, only a colorless mucus is secreted.) (5 Especially on the hands, the outer side of the arms and legs, and even in the face; the skin is dry, rough, parched, feels chapped, and often has scales like bran.) Disagreeable sensation of dryness over the whole body (also in the face, around and in the mouth, in the throat, or in the nose, although the breath passes freely through it). Perspiration comes too easily from slight motion; even while sitting, he is attacked with perspiration all over, or merely on some parts; e.g., almost constant perspiration of the hands and feet,1 so also, strong perspiration in the axillae2 and around the pudenda. Daily morning sweats, often causing the patient to drip, this for many years, often with sour or pungent-sour smell.3 One-sided perspiration, only on one side of the body, or only on, the upper part of the body, or only on the lower part. Increasing susceptibility to colds either of the whole body (often even from repeatedly wetting the hands, now with warm water, then with cold, as in washing clothes), or only susceptibility of certain parts of the body, of the head, the neck, the chest, the abdomen, the feet, etc., often in a moderate or slight draught, or after slightly moistening these parts;4 even from being in a cooler room, in a rainy atmosphere, or with a low barometer. So-called weather prophets; i.e., renewed severe pains in parts of the body which were formerly injured, wounded, or broken, though they have since been healed and cicatrized; this renewed pain sets in, when great changes of the weather, great cold, or a storm are imminent, or when a thunderstorm is in the air. Watery swelling, either of the feet alone, or in one foot, or in the hands, or the face, or the abdomen, or the scrotum, etc., alone, or again cutaneous swelling over the whole body (dropsies). Attacks of sudden heaviness of the arms or legs. Attacks of paralytic weakness and paralytic lassitude of the one arm, the one hand, the one leg, without pain, either arising suddenly and passing quickly, or commencing gradually and constantly increasing. ----- (1 The latter is usually very fetid and so abundant that, after even a short walk, the soles of the feet, the heels and toes are soaked and sore.) (2 Not infrequently of red color or of a rank small like that of he goats or that of garlic.) (3 Here belongs the perspiration of psoric children on their head after going to sleep in the evening.) (4 The ailments following from it, immediately afterwards, are then considerable and manifold: Pains in the limbs, headaches, catarrh, sore throat, and inflammation of the throat, coryza, swelling of the glands of the neck, hoarseness cough, dyspnoea, stitches in the chest, fever, troubles of digestion, colic, vomiting, diarrhoea, stomachache, rising of water from the stomach, also stitches in the face and other parts, jaundice-like color of the skin, etc. No person who is not psoric ever suffers the least after-effects from such causes.) Sudden bending of the knees. Children fall easily, without any visible cause. Also similar attacks of weakness with adults in the legs, so that in walking one foot glides this way and the other that way, etc. While walking in the open air sudden attacks of faintness, especially in the legs.1 While sitting, the patient feels intolerably weary, but stronger while walking. The predisposition to spraining and straining the joints at a mis-step, or a wrong grasp, increases at times even to dislocation; e. g., in the tarsus, the shoulder-joint, etc. The snapping and cracking of the joints at any motion of the limb increases with a disagreeable sensation. The going to sleep of the limbs increases and follows on slight causes; e.g., in supporting the head with the arm, crossing the legs while sitting, etc. The painful cramps in some of the muscles increase and come on without appreciable cause. Slow, spasmodic straining of the flexor muscles of the limbs. Sudden jerks of some muscles and limbs even while waking; e.g., of the tongue, the lips, the muscles of the face, of the pharynx, of the eyes, of the jaws, of the hands and of the feet. Tonic shortening of the flexor muscles (tetanus). Involuntary turning and twisting of the head, or the limbs, with full consciousness (St. Vitus' dance). Sudden fainting spells and sinking of the strength, with loss of consciousness. Attacks of tremor in the limbs, without anxiety. Continuous, constant trembling, also in some cases beating with the hands, the arms, the legs. Attacks of loss of consciousness, lasting a moment or a minute, with an inclination of the head to the one shoulder, with or without jerks of one part or the other. Epilepsies of various kinds. Almost constant yawning, stretching and straining of the limbs. Sleepiness during the day, often immediately after sitting down, especially after meals. Difficulty in falling asleep, when abed in the evening; he often lies awake for hours. ----- (1 At times the feeling of faintness seems to rise up even to the scrobiculus cordis, where it turns into a ravenous hunger, which suddenly deprives him of all strength; he is attacked with tremor and has immediately to lie down for a while.) He passes the nights in a mere slumber. Sleeplessness, from anxious heat, every night, an anxiety which sometimes rises so high, that he must get up from his bed and walk about. After three o'clock in the morning, no sleep, or at least no sound sleep. As soon as he closes his eyes, all manner of fantastic appearances and distorted faces appear. In going to sleep, she is disquieted by strange, anxious fancies; she has to get up and walk about. Very vivid dreams, as if awake; or sad, frightful, anxious, vexing, lascivious dreams. Loud talking, screaming; during sleep. Somnambulism; he rises up at night, while sleeping with closed eyes, and attends to various duties; he performs even dangerous feats with ease, without knowing anything about them when awake. Attacks of suffocation while sleeping (nightmare). Various sorts of severe pains at night, or nocturnal thirst, dryness of the throat, of the month, or frequent urinating at night. Early on awaking, dizzy, indolent, unfreshed, as if he had not done sleeping and more tired than in the evening, when he lay down; it takes him several hours (and only after rising) before he can recover from this weariness. After a very restless night, he often has more strength in the morning, than after a quiet, sound sleep. Intermittent fever, even when there are no cases about, either sporadic or epidemic,1 or endemic; the form, duration and type of the fever are very various; quotidian, tertian, quartan, quintan or every seven days. Every evening, chills with blue nails. Every evening, single chills. Every evening, heat, with a rush of blood to the head, with red cheeks, also at times an intervening chill. Intermittent fever of several weeks duration, followed by a moist itching eruption lasting several weeks, but which is healed again during a like period of intermittent fever, and alternating thus for years. Disturbances of the mind and spirit of all kinds.2 ----- (1 Epidemic intermittent fevers probably never seize a man who is free from psora, so that wherever there is a susceptibility to them, it is to be accounted a symptom of psora.) (2 I have never either in my practice, nor in any insane asylum, seen a patient suffering from melancholy, insanity, or frenzy whose disease did not have Psora as its foundation, complicated at times, however, though rarely, with syphilis.) Melancholy by itself, or with insanity, also at times alternating with frenzy and hours of rationality. Anxious oppression, early on awaking. Anxious oppression in the evening after going to bed.1 Anxiety, several times a day (with and without pains), or at certain hours of the day or of the night; usually the patient then finds no rest, but has to run hither and thither, and often falls into perspiration. Melancholy, palpitation and anxiousness causes her at night to wake up from sleep (mostly just before the beginning of the menses). Maria of self-destruction2 (spleen ?). A weeping mood; they often weep for hours without knowing a cause for it.3 Attacks of fear; e.g., fear of fire, of being alone, of apoplexy, of becoming insane, etc. ----- (1 This causes some patients to break out into a strong perspiration; others feel from it merely flushes of blood and throbbing in all the arteries; with others, the anxious oppression tends to constrict the throat, threatening suffocation if all the blood in their arteries were standing still, causing anguish. With others, this oppression is associated with anxious images and thoughts, and seems to rise from them, while with others, there is oppression without anxious ideas and thoughts.) (2 This kind of disease of the mind or spirit, which is also merely psoric, seems not to have been taken into consideration. Without feeling any anxiety, or anxious thoughts, therefore also, without any one's perceiving such anxiety in them, apparently in the full exercise of their reason, they are impelled, urged, yea, compelled by a certain feeling of necessity, to self-destruction. They are only healed by a cure of the Psora, if their utterances are noticed in time. I say in time, for in the last stages of this kind of insanity it is peculiarly characteristic of this disease, not to utter anything about such a determination to anyone. This frenzy manifests itself in fits of one-half or of whole hours, usually in the end daily, often at certain times of the day. But besides these fits of destructive mania, such persons have usually also fits of anxious oppression, which seem, however, to be independent of the former fits, and come at other hours, accompanied partly with pulsation in the pit of the stomach, but during these they are not tormented with the desire of taking their own life. These attacks of anxiety which seem to be more of a bodily nature, and are not connected with the other train of thoughts, may also be lacking, while the fits of suicidal mania rule in a high degree; they may also return, when that mania is in a great part extinguished through the anti-psoric remedies, so that the two seem to be independent of one another, though they have the same original malady for their foundation.) (3 This is a symptom, however, which seems to be caused by the diseased state, especially of the female sex, in order to soothe temporarily more and greater nervous disorders.) Attacks of passion, resembling frenzy. Fright caused by the merest trifles; this often causes perspiration and trembling. Disinclination to work, in persons who else are most industrious; no impulse to occupy himself, but rather the most decided repugnance thereto. 1 Excessive sensitiveness.2 Irritability from weakness.3 Quick change of moods; often very merry and exuberantly so, often again and, indeed, very suddenly, dejection; e.g., on account of his disease, or from other trifling causes. Sudden transition from cheerfulness to sadness, or vexation without a cause. These are some of the leading symptoms observed by me, which, if they are often repeated, or become constant, show that the internal Psora is coining forth from its latent state. They are at the same time the elements, from which (under unfavorable external conditions) the itch-malady, as it manifests itself, composes the illimitable number of chronic diseases, and with one man assumes the one form, with another another, according to the bodily constitution, defects in the education, habits, employment and external circumstances, as also modified by the various psychical and physical impressions. It thus unfolds into manifold forms of disease, with so many varieties, that they are by no means exhausted by the disease-symptoms enumerated in the pathology of the old school, and erroneously designated there as well-defined, constant and peculiar diseases.* ----- (1 Such a person, when she desired to begin one of her domestic occupations, was seized with anxiety and oppression; her limbs trembled, and she became suddenly so weary, she had to lie down.) (2 All physical and psychical impressions, even the weaker and the weakest, cause a morbid excitement, often in a high degree. Occurrences affecting the mind, not only such as are of a sad and vexatious kind, but also those of a joyous kind, cause surprising ailments and disorders; touching tales, yea, even thinking of them and recalling them, cause a tumultuous excitement of the nerves, and drive the anxiety into the head, etc. Even a little reading about indifferent things, or looking attentively at an object; e.g., while sewing, attentively listening even to indifferent things, too bright a light, the loud talking of several people at the same time, even single tones on a musical instrument, the ringing of bells, etc., cause harmful impressions: trembling, weariness, headache, chills, etc. Often the senses of smell and of taste are immoderately sensitive. In many cases even moderate bodily motion, or speaking, also warmth, cold, open air, wetting the skin with water, etc. Not a few suffer even in their room from a sudden change of the weather, while most of these patients complain during stormy wet weather, few of dry weather with a clear sky. The full moon also with some persons and the new moon with other, has an unfavorable erect.) (* They bear the following names: Scrofula, rickets, spina ventosa, atrophy, marasmus, consumption, pulmonary consumption, asthma, tabes mucosa, laryngeal phthisis, chronic catarrh, constant coryza, difficult dentition, worms and consequent diseases, dyspepsia, abdominal cramps, hypochondria, hysteria, dropsy, dropsy of the abdomen, dropsy of the ovaries, of the uterus, hydrocele, hydrocephalus, amenorrhoea, dysmenorrhoea, uterine haemorrhages, hematemesis, haemoptysis and haemorrhages, vaginal haemorrhages, dysuria, ischuria, enuresis, diabetes, catarrh of the bladder, hematuria, nephralgia, gravel of the kidneys, stricture of the urethra, stricture of the intestines, blind and running piles, fistula of the rectum, difficult stools, constipation, chronic diarrhoea, induration of the liver, jaundice, cyanosis, heart diseases, palpitation, spasms of the chest, dropsy of the chest, abortion, sterility, metromania, impotence, induration of the testicles, dwindling of the testicles, prolapsus uteri, inversion of the womb, inguinal, femoral and umbilical hernias, dislocations of the joints from an internal cause, curvature of the spine, chronic inflammations of the eyes, fistula lachrymalis, short-sightedness and long-sightedness, day blindness and night blindness, obscuration of the cornea, cataracts, glaucoma, amaurosis, deafness, deficient smell or taste, chronic one-sided headache, megrim, tic douloureux, tinea capitis, scab, crusta lactea, tetters (herpes), pimples, nettle-rash, encysted tumors, goitre, varices, aneurism, erysipelas, sarcomas, ostecsarcoina, scirrhus, cancer of the lips, cheeks, breast, uterus, fungus nematodes, rheumatism, gout in the hips, knotty gout, podagra, apoplectic fits, swoons, vertigo, paralysis, contractions, tetanus, convulsions, epilepsy, St. Vitus' dance, melancholy, insanity, imbecility, nervous debility, etc.) These are the characteristic secondary symptoms,* of the long-unacknowledged, thousand-headed monster, pregnant with disease, the psora, the original miasmatic malady which now makes its manifest appearance. ----- (* The supreme royal councillor Kopp, an Allopath, who is unwillingly and only half and half approaching Homoeopathy, pretends to have seen chronic diseases disappear of themselves - he may have seen some particular symptoms disappear, which symptoms the old school, in its shortsighted fashion, considered, with him as so many entire diseases!) (I will grant that the doctrine, that all chronic non-venereal diseases which are not extinguishable by the vital force, in an orderly course of life, while external circumstances are favorable, but which even increase with the years, are of psoric origin, is for all who have not fully weighed my reasons and for all narrow-minded people, too great, too overwhelming. But it is none the less true. Or should we regard such a chronic disease as not being psoric, because the patient cannot remember, that he at sometime, all the way back to his birth, has had several or more (intolerably voluptuously) itching pustules of itch on his skin, or (since the itch-disease is considered as something disgraceful) is not willing to acknowledge it? His non-acknowledgment here proves nothing to the contrary. Since at all times, all the innumerable chronic diseases resulting from an acknowledged preceding itch (when this has not been cured) are ineradicable through the vital force, and advance in their equable course as psoric ailments, and are continually aggravated: so long as the doubters of the psora doctrine cannot show me any other source which is at least as probable for a (non-veneric) ailment, which, despite of favorable external conditions, correct diet, good morality and vigorous bodily constitution, nevertheless increases every year, without any preceding infection from itch so far as memory goes: so long I have on my side an overpowering analogous probability, i.e., 100 to 1, that also the individual cases of chronic disease, which show a like progression, probably also are, yea, must also be of a psoric nature, although the patient cannot or will not remember a preceding infection. It is easy to doubt matters which cannot be laid before our ocular vision, but in itself this doubt proves nothing at all, for according to the old rule of logic: negantis est probare. To prove the psoric nature of these chronic diseases without acknowledged infection, we do not even need the fact that the anti-psoric remedies prove effectual therein; this serves only like the proof to a correctly solved mathematical problem. Now since, in addition, the other remedies, although also selected according to the similarity of their symptoms, do not by far yield so durable and thorough a cure in such chronic diseases, as those which are recognized as anti-psoric, and which are selected in as Homoeopathic a manner, because these more than the others are adequate to the whole extent of the endless number of symptoms of the great psora malady: I do not see why men will deny to the latter the title of the especially anti-psoric remedies, unless this springs from dogmatism. And just as little is there any good reason for contradicting me, when I (Organon, §73,) explain the acute diseases which return from time to time; e.g., inflammations of the throat, of the chest, etc., as flaming up from a latent psora, simply because their inflammatory state, as they say, is mostly to be combated by means of the anti-phlogistic remedies, which are not anti-psoric; i.e., Aconite, Belladonna, Mercury and the like. These, nevertheless, have their source in a latent psora, because their customary return cannot be prevented by anything but a final cure with anti-psoric remedies. |
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