INTRODUCTION
Lead. See Noack and Trinks. “Handbuch.”.
COMPARE WITH.
Alumina Belladonna, chin., Conium, Hyoscyamus, Mercurius, Natr-mur., Nux-v., Opium, Phosph. Platina, Sabad., Sec-c., Stramonium, Sulphur, Veratrum, Zincum met.
ANTIDOTES.
Alumina, Ac-sulph in the shape of a lemonade, Belladonna, Hyoscyamus, Mercurius, Nux-v., Opium, Pulsatilla, Sabad., Sec-c., Stramonium, Strychnine. Plumbum antidotes the bad effects occasioned by long abuse of Vinegar.
GENERAL SYMPTOMS.
ARTHRALGIA SATURNINA. Intense pains in the limbs and trunk, relieved by pressure, aggravated by motion. The pain, which is the characteristic symptoms of the affection, is generally felt at night. Exhaustion and weariness, weakness. Great failing of strength. Excessive languor (By.).
anaesthesia SATURNINA.
Deep-seated anaesthesia of the limbs and trunk. Skin, cellular tissue, and muscles are insensible to the action of external stimuli. Superficial or cutaneous anaesthesia. It attains its highest degree of violence within a day or a few hours.
PARALYSIS SATURNINA.
Consisting in debility or in suppression of the voluntary motion, particularly that of the extensor muscles. If the paralysis continue, the affected parts become greatly emaciated. General paralysis of the upper limbs, always accompanied with a phony and difficulty of speech. Paralysis of the arm, wrist- joint, and hand. General paralysis of the lower extremities. Atrophy frequently sets in after the lapse of one month. Paralysis of the thigh. Paralysis of the trunk, foot, muscles of the organs of speech.
HEMIPLEGIA.
Convulsions, of an epileptic nature, following each other in rapid succession. Attacks of EPILEPSY, with foam at the mouth, succeeding each other rapidly, and sometimes terminating in apoplexy, catalepsy, combination of epilepsy, delirium, and coma.
CACHEXIA SATURNINA.
Emaciations of the sense. Apoplexy. Jaundice. Edema of the face and feet. Anasarca.
SKIN.
Excessive sensitiveness of the skin. Serious infiltration of the skin. Jaundiced appearance and oedematous condition of the skin. Skin rough, dry, scaly, yellowish.
SLEEP.
Restless sleep. Sleeplessness. Somnolence. Sopor. Coma, sometimes with partial delirium.
FEVER.
Chilliness. Intolerable heat. Cold sweat on the forehead and over the whole body. Great thirst. Slow pulse. Pulse small, sluggish, spasmodic, intermittent, particularly during the spasm. Pulsus-dicrotus. Undulating pulse.
PATHOGENETIC EFFECTS OF DIVERS PREPARATIONS OF LEAD.
Mind and disposition. Lowness of spirits and indifference. Restless, hopeless. Indifference and somnolence. Mental derangement and difficulty of motion. Loss of memory. Loss of all the senses, the convulsions returning with increased violence. Idiocy. Melancholia. Fright. Delirium, after violent p73 and frequently attacks of colic. Delirium, furious, constant, or intermitting, nightly, alternating with sopor (Br), calm and furious loquacity, frequently alternating with rage (Br). ENCEPHALOPATHIA SATURNINA (generally consisting of delirium, coma, and convulsions, without fever, from four to seventeen days); precursory symptoms: violent headache, of different degrees of intensity; general or partial pains in the head, most frequently in the region of the forehead, frequently with vertigo and tremulousness; sleeplessness, or else sleep disturbed by dreams or hallucination, ringing in the ears, weakness of sight, amaurosis, diplopia, contraction and dilatation of the pupils; squinting. Stupor. Dysphagia. Paralysis. Colic. Encephalopathia, with delirium. Furious delirium : the eyes are widely open, threatening, wild the features are spasmodically contracted. Every opposition of force brings on an attack of rage. Confused delirium, with abrupt stuttering words and loud voice. Sometimes the delirium progresses in paroxysms, with lucid intervals. The bland and furious delirium frequently alternate. Some patients are attacked with bland delirium in the daytime and furious delirium at night. Between the paroxysms of alternate delirium the patients are soporous.
HEAD.
Vertigo. Epileptic vertigo. Headache. Violent pains in the integuments of the skull from occiput to the forehead. Headache, with vomiting, and violent pains in the umbilical region (Br).
EYES.
Contraction in the eyes and particularly in the eye-lids. Complete paralysis and insensibility of the eye-lids. Profuse discharge of acrid tears and diminution of sight. Faint, sad look. Protruded eyes, with staring look. Sunken eyes. Bluish, lead colored sclerotica. Contraction of the pupils. Mistiness of sight. Blindness. Amaurosis saturnina several paroxysms of colic, pain convulsions or paralysis of the hands are succeeded by sudden obscuration of sight, increasing in a few hours to perfect blindness, and generally disappearing as suddenly. Diagnostic characteristics of the Lead amaurosis are the characteristic mode in which it develops itself the considerable dilatation of the pupil, which is of unequal extent and changes with the excessive rapidity the black, non-transparent bottom of the eye, and, lastly, the fact one eye never gets blind alone.
EARS.
Buzzing in the ears. Diminution of hearing and sight.
NOSE.
Bleeding of the nose. Loss of smell.
FACE.
Clay-colored face. Death-like, lead-colored face, Swelling of the face eye-lids, abdomen, and feet. Sunken features. Emaciation.
TEETH.
The gums are interstitially distended. Turgescence of the gums. The portion of the gums which is nearest the teeth exhibits a violent-colored border, changing to a bluish ash-color, which sometimes extends over the mouth. The teeth turn black. Looseness and falling out of the teeth.
MOUTH.
Dryness of the mouth. Aphthae. Dry tongue, which is frequently covered with a brown crust. The tongue and lips are painful, with salivation and fetid smell from the mouth, attended with languor, loss of appetite burning sensation in the stomach, nausea and vomiting. Salivation. Dragging, scarcely-audible speech. Aphonia.
THROAT.
Constriction of the throat.
APPETITE.
Astringent taste in the mouth. Loss of appetite. Apepsia and dyspepsia. Violent hunger. Excessive thirst.
STOMACH.
Hiccough. Troublesome eructations. Sour, sweet, bitter eructations.
Loathing. Inclination to vomit and loathing. Retching, with discharge of a sour fluid (Richt). Vomiting. Vomiting of a black substance. Vomiting of bilious and foul substance. Heaviness in the stomach. Oppression of the pit of the stomach. violent pains in the region of the stomach and umbilicus. Great sensitiveness of the epigastrium. Violent burning pains in the region of the stomach, and tumultuous vomiting. Constrictive pain in the praecordia. Paroxysms of cardialgia.
ABDOMEN.
Affections of the spleen. Continual pressure in the epigastric region. Excessive pains in the abdomen, with oppression in the praecordia, trembling and weakness of the limbs. Violent pains in the region of the umbilicus, with obstinate constipation. Pinching in the abdomen. Meteorism. Sunken abdomen. Retraction of the abdomen, not bearing to be touched. Constant pressure, with anguish in the praecordia, dry cough, lacerating colicky pains. Tormina intestinorum. Inflammation of the bowels, mesentery, peritoneum, terminating in ulceration and gangrene. Colic and paralysis of the lower extremities. Colic the face is bloated reddened the eyes glistening and protruded from the socks, the tongue dry as well as the mouth and reddened, with tormenting thirst, and desire for cold water, distention of the abdomen and sensitiveness to contact the pains are relieved by strong and deep pressure.
COLICA SATURNINA (Lead Colic).
Intolerable pains in the abdomen, frightful anguish, uneasiness day and night. Violent, alternately-burning and lacerating pains in the umbilical region, extending through the whole abdomen. Accompanied with a violent anguish and oppression, ineffectual tenesmus, vomiting of a viscid, and frequently sour smelling mucus, which is rarely mixed with bile burning in the oesophagus and spasmodic constriction of the throat. An evacuation of the bowels was accompanied with the most violent pains and tenesmus. Sleep uneasy, anxious, disturbed with frightful dreams. Colic- umbilicalis: pain in the region of the umbilicus retraction and even deep depression of the umbilical region, with hardness of the corresponding abdominal walls, constipation nausea, vomiting, very rarely, however and at long intervals, with scanty discharge. Colic-epigastrica pain retraction and hardness, of the epigastric region, nausea and frequently copious vomiting. Beating of the arteries in the epigastric regions. Dyspnoea, jaundice. Colic hypogastric with difficulty of micturition, tenesmus of the bladder pains and spasmodic movements in the region of the genital organs. Colic-renalis pain in the region of the kidneys.
STOOL.
Dysentery attended with excessive colic. Sluggish stool. Scanty, hard, black-brown faeces, resembling sheep’s dung. Alternation of diarrhoea and constipation. Ineffectual tenesmus. Disposition to constipation.
ARMS.
Constriction of the sphincter ani. Ineffectual, exhausting urging inducing the formation of haemorrhoidal tumors.
