American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy

Dose of the bulb, from. two to eight grains; of the seed, from one to five
grains.
CONSTITUENTS—
Colchicine, Colchicortesin, Beta-colchicoresin.
PREPARATIONS—
Specific Colchicum. Dose, from one-fourth minim to three minims.
Extractum Colchici Semini Fluidum. Fluid Extract of Colchicum
Seed. Dose, from one to five minims.
Vinum Colchici Radicis. Wine, of Colchicum Root (when made from
the fresh bulb). Dose, from one to five minims. It should be discontinued
as soon as violent catharsis or any depressing effects are observed.
Physiological Action—Moderate doses cause some gastro-intestinal
irritation, with loss of appetite, colic and diarrhea; if the quantity is
increased there is bilious vomiting, irritation of the colon with colicky
pains, bloody and mucous stools, but without tenderness on pressure
over the abdomen; while poisonous doses cause violent gastro-intestinal
irritation, griping, purging, vomiting, painful spasms of the limbs and
trunk, collapse, delirium, coma and death.
It is a cathartic and depressant of vital action, in large doses, an irritant
poison inducing the phenomena of acute cholera, with enfeeblement of
the heart's action and of the circulation.
Therapy—A recent Homeopathic writer, finds the indications for
colchicum very often present in vomiting and the nausea of pregnancy.
His success has been so prompt and gratifying, that he seldom uses other
remedies. It is indicated when there is a clear, glairy, stringy fluid
vomited, the nausea aggravated by smell of food.
In autumnal diarrhea, with white or bloody mucous discharges, the
remedy gives immediate results.
The remedy is seldom used for its cathartic influence but has long been
given as a magical eliminative in chronic rheumatism and gout. It has a
specific influence upon muscular pains, acting in harmony with
cimicifuga, with which it is usually prescribed, and with gelsemium. It
must be given always short of its cathartic action; even then, when
continued for some time, it depresses the heart and the nervous system,
producing a feeble pulse and cool skin. It is seldom given in acute
Ellingwood’s American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy - Page 141