The Science of Therapeutics - Classical Homeopathy Online

Full text of "The Science of Therapeutics: According to the Principles of Homeopath...Page 290 of 653Pleuritis, Pleurisy. 839attention to this drug. in cases of pleuritis caused by or compliwith, pyaemia or septicaemia, and constituting from the start a sof purulent infiltration.Mercurius is recommended by few physicians for pleuritis, andyet it is perhaps more appropriate in this disease than in pneumonia. We know from our Materia Medica Pura that quicksilvercauses a number of symptoms pointing to pleuritis; hence itshomcBopathicity to this disease cannot be gainsayed. Moreoveranalogy justifies the conclusion that Mercurius has just as goodefiTect in pleuritis as in peritonitis, because we know that Mercacts upon definite systems rather than upon single organs. Aspneumonia so in pleuritis, Mercurius is indicated, if the exudatiinclines from the start to change to pus, or if this tendency isimparted to it at a later period without, however, a special tendto decomposition manifesting itself along with it. The followingsymptoms constitute essential indications: violent fever with frequent chills followed by a burning heat and exhausting, foulling perspiration; considerable thirst; marked gastric catarrh wislight icteric symptoms ; intestinal catarrh. In pleurolikewise,if the exudation is somewhat copious, Mercurius is oneof the best remedies. In subacute empyema we do not considerMercurius an appropriate remedy. Several reports in our literaturshow that Mercurius has often rendered distinguished services inepidemic pleurisy, both if the character of the disease was intenrheumatic, or when the disease was complicated with bronchitis.Old School experience, according to which mercurial ointment isemployed in exudative pleuritis with an advantage that cannoteven be denied by the dogmatic adherents of the expectant method,can likewise be appealed to as an additional recommendation forthe use of Mercurius.Hellcborus niger has not as yet been exhaustively proved ; its losymptoms point, however, unmistakably to a pleuritic affecticm.Practical trials have led several physicians to I'ecommeud thisremedy for the serous exudation in pleuritis, to which it is undoubtedly more adapted than to hydrothorax.Arsenicum album is not, in our opinion, a remedy belonging in thecategory of anti-pleuritic medicines. Its exhibition in pleuritiswell as in pneumonia is determined by the general rather than thelocal symptoms. Wurmb expresses himself much more favorablyconcerning this drug in the following words: "In serous eft usionArsenic is probably the most important remedy; my confidence in840 Diseases of the Pleura'.this agent is so great that I doubt the possibility of curing a cwhere Arsenic does not effect the least improvement, as may possibly be the case with hemorrhagic effusions which defy all interference of art. The cases where Arsenic does not afford any relieare not very frequent, whereas this medicine alone effects a numbof cures or changes the form of the disease so that the cure caneasily be completed by other remedies. The beneficent effect ofArsenic generally first shows itself by a change in the distressihttp://www.archive.org/stream/sciencetherapeu00kafkgoog/sciencetherapeu00kafkgoog_djvu.txt