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CINCHONA
OFFICINALIS (CHINA OFF.)
Botanical Name:
Peruvian bark. Common Names- Crown Bark, Foso Bark,
Jesuits' Bark, Red Bark.
Medicinal Part:- The
bark.
Description:
The bark is obtained from the Cinchona Calisaya,
Cinchona Condaminea, Cinchona Succirubra and Cinchona
Lancifolia. These trees are evergreen or shrubs. About
thirteen varieties of cinchon are known to commerce, but
the above are the most important. Of these species the
former three yield respectively the pale yellow and red
cinchona barks, and fourth is one of the source of
quinine.
Cinchona is a very old discovery, and
takes its names from the wife of the Spanish viceroy,
County de Cinchon, who was cured of fever by it at Lima,
about the year 1638. From some time after its
introduction into Europe, the Jesuits, who received the
bark from their brethren in Peru, alone used it and kept
to themselves the secret of its origin; and their use of
it was so successful that it received the name which
till clings to it of 'Jesuits' Bark. The bark richest
in the antiperiodic alkaloids is the Cinchona Calisaya,.
The geographical range of the cinchonas appears to be
exclusively confined to the Andes, within the boundaries
of Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador and New Granada.
Thirteen species furnish the barks of
commerce, and all of them were found growing from one to
ten thousand feet above the level of sea . The four
species named above however, are the only ones
recognized by the United States pharmacopoeia, and are
favorites every where. Since the seventeenth century
these barks have been the study of the men versed in
medical and chemical science and they and the
preparation made from them rank among the most important
articles of the Materia Medica. It contains numerous
active principals, but the most important is the
quinine.
Homeopathically, it was this very bark
which gave a breakthrough in the discovery of Homeopathy
by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann.
This remedy is used by both
schools of medicine for conditions of great weakness and
debility. The old school, as they always do, prescribe
it for all cases of debility, on general principles,
under the name of tonic. It remained for Homeopathy to
indicate its exact place here.
(I) OLD MALARIAL
CONDITIONS THAT HAVE BEEN SUPPPRESSED WITH QUININE;
GRADUALLY INCREASING PALLOR, BLOODLESSNESS, CACHEXIA,
UNTIL THE PATIENT IS ALWAYS CATCHING COLD, HAS LIVER
TROUBLES, BOWEL TROUBLES, DISORDERED STOMACH, IS MADE
MISERABLE AND SICK BY NEARLY EVERYTHING HE DOES.
(II) DEBILITY AND OTHER
COMPLAINTS AFTER EXCESSIVE LOSS OF FLUIDS,
BLOOD LETTING, OR OTHER FLUIDS
PARTICULARLY BY NURSING OR WHITES, SEMINAL EMISSIONS
ETC. AND EVEN AFTER LONG CONTINUED DIARRHOEA.
If the depletion has been sudden, as
from a haemorrhage from womb, lungs, bowels or nose,
there will be faintness,loss of sight, ringing in the
ears, etc. For this state of things we have a friend
indeed , in China and it should be given in frequently
repeated doses, not too low, until reaction is
established; then at longer intervals, as occasion
demands.
Dr. Nash says that it is always well when
a patient comes to us in a very debilitated condition to
think of China, and to make careful inquiry for some
debilitating waste that would account for it, for if it
is a women she may be suffering from a very profuse
leucorrhoea, which from delicacy she will not mention,
or if a young or even married man, he may be suffering
from seminal losses, of which he would not speak if not
encouraged to do so.
MIND SYMPTOMS:-
Nervous, sensitive patient. Weakness of mind, Inability
to think or remember. Full of fear at night. Fear of
animals, dogs, or creeping things. Wants to commit
suicide but lacks courage. Gradually the mind grows
weaker , he plans, theorizing, building air castles.
In the morning he wonders how he could
have thought of such foolish things. After sleep his
mind is clear and he looks more philosophically on the
affairs of life. Unable to entertain any mental
proposition that means work. He dreads work. He is
apathetic, indifferent, low spirited, silent,
disinclined to think. He is unable to control the mind,
to make it do what he wants it to do. You see it is not
as yet a realy insanity.
The above state mind comes on after
haemorrhage. Insomnia after haemorrhage. A woman,
after having suffered great loss of blood, will be
sleepless night after night.
After haemorrhage we may have
dizziness. It is a natural consequence, dizziness and
fainting. But ordinarily, after the proper diet for a
few days these symptoms will have disappeared. With
China patient, they go from bad to worse. The woman
after severe haemorrhage does not make blood. There is
mal-assimilation, and the vertigo persists for days and
weeks. China will restore order.
HEAD SYMPTOMS:-
The remedy is full of headaches. Congestive headaches
in broken down constitutions. Extremities cold and body
covered with a cold sweat. Pressing and throbbing
pains. As soon as the air strikes the head those pains
come. Headache >warm room,<from touch,motion,cold,
night time. These are the principal features. A
slight touch will aggravate the disturbance. But notice
the exception, HARD PRESSURE ameliorates the China
pains, as light pressure aggravates. Headaches from
sexual excesses; loss of animal fluids The scalp is
sensitive and <combing.
EYE SYMPTOMS:-
Photophobia. Yellowness of the sclera . Exposure to
cold wind will bring on neuralgia,>keeping quiet and
from keeping warm. "Nocturnal blindness, dimness of
vision. Feeling as if sand in the eyes. Pains<light.,
>darkness.
EAR
: In the ear you will find the same
sensitiveness as in the eyes; every little noise is
painful. Ringing, roaring, buzzing and singing,
chirping like crickets in the ears. Dry catarrh of the
middle ear. Heardness of hearing is not infrequently
the result of this condition. It gradually increases
until there is total deafness and the noises in the ear
continue long after the patient has lost the ability to
distinguish articulate sounds. Haemorrhage from the
ear.
NOSE:-
Frequent nosebleed in anaemic patients. Here, again the
dryness and catarrhal conditions. Dry coryza ; or
fluent coryza supressed and causing violent head pains.
Odors nauseate. Sensitivenes to the odors of flowers,
cooking, tobacco.
FACE:
The face is withered, shrunken, sallow, anaemic sickly.
Red when the fever/chill is on but pale during apyrexia
with the usal modalities.
MOUTH:-
The teeth gets loose, the gums swell. The teeth are
painful while chewing and feel too long.Toothache with
everylittle cold. Rending as if teeth were being pulled
out, every time the child nurses at the breast.
STOMACH:-
Bitter taste in the mouth. Sometimes thee is canine
hunger, but one of the most common features is loathing
of everything; aversion to all food The China patient is
often passive in regard to eating. Sits down to eat and
the food tastes fairly good and he fills up . HUNGRY YET
WANT OF APETITE.LOSS OF APETITE. Actually his apetite
varies. Thirst is peculiar.
The patient will say:'I know my chill is
coming on now because I have thirst.' Thirst before
chill, but as soon as the chill comes on there is no
thirst. But when he begins to warm up he begins to get
thirst; that is during the period in which the two lap
he is thirst, but when the chill has fairly subsided and
the heat is upon him his thirst subsides also and he
only wants to wet his mouth .But as the hot spell begins
to subside he increases the amount taken and all through
the sweat he can hardly get water enough.Thist before
and after the chill and thirst
during the sweat. No thirst during the chill. No
thirst during the hot spell. So china has well defined
chill, fever and sweat.
ABDOMEN:-
Flatulent colic >bending double. Tympanitic abdomen.
Pain in right hypochondrium. Gall stone colic.
There are constant eructations, loud and strong, and yet
no relief, so extensive is the flatulence. In CARBO VEG
after the belching a litter, there is relief. LYCOPIUM
has both.Vomitting, eructations, tasting of food or they
are bitter, our. Frequent vomitting, of sour mucus,
bile , blood. Likely to occur at night. Pulsation in
the stomach and rumbling . Cold feeling in the stokach.
Fermentation after eating fruit. Acidity. Disorders of
the stomach after milk. (MILK DISAGREES).
STOOL: Diarrhoea,
undigested, yellow, painless, worse at night , after
meals, hot weather, from fruit, milk , beer.Very
weakening with much flatulence.
MALE:
Frequent emissions, followed by great weakness.
FEMALE:-
Women who has been subject to uterine haemorrhages you
look out at any moment for a sudden,sharp attack of
inflammation of the ovaries. Haemorrhage from the
uterus. Prolpse. Menses too early and too profuse;
black clotted blood; menstrual colic; metrorrhagia.
Pains and convulsions; convulsions come on in the midst
of the haemorrhage; cramps in the uterus alsong with
haemorrhage; labor-like pains; ringing in the ears, loss
of sight. In confinement the lochia is profuse and
lasts too logn. Deterioration of health from prolonged
lactation, toothache; neuralgia of the fact.
FEVER:
China cures low forms of fever, remittent or
intermittent, typhoid or malarial. All should accompany
the symptoms of chill fever and sweat.
RESPIRATORY:
Influenza with debility. Difficult respiration,
rattling and filling up of the chest with mucus ;
asthma. Pressure in the chest, as from violent rust of
blood; violent palpitation, bloody sputa Sudden
prostration. Dry suffocative cough at night, profuse
night sweats. Pains in the chest, increasing
sensitiveness to cold, heat and redness of the face with
cold hands.
BACK
: Along the spine there are sore spots. Tearing,
darting pains in the limbs >heat and hard pressure,
brought on by touch, by becoming chilled. <night.
Knees weak especially when walking.
MODALITIES:
<SLIGHTEST TOUCH. Draught of air, every other day; loss
of vital fluids, at night, after eating,
bending over, > bending double, haard pressure; open
waarmth.
Relationship: Antidotes Arn. Ars.Nux.Ipec.
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