Part 5 (1/2)

Common Headache,

If the face is red, and the arteries of the neck and temples throb violently, give _Bell._ If there is paleness and faintness, _Pulsatilla_ is the remedy, especially if the forehead is princ.i.p.ally affected. If the pain is mostly in the back of the head, _Nux_ is to be used; if in the front, and is sharp, affecting the eyes, _Aconite_; if at the angles of the forehead, with a sense of pinching, _Arnica_; if a sense of fullness and pressing outwards, or with an enlarged feeling, _Macrotin_; if intermitting or remitting, _Mercurius_; if there is ringing in the ears, _China_. Headache from fright should have _Aconite_.

For that kind of _headache_ that often occurs during the prevalence of fevers, and is not unfrequently a premonitory symptom of an attack of fever, I have found _Baptisia_ and _Podophyllin_ to be specifics. I give them alternately, every two hours a dose, until the headache ceases. It often subsides in a few minutes after the first dose of either, though I have sometimes failed with one alone and succeeded in the same cases afterwards with both in alternation. _I have no doubt_ but that they act in many cases, as _Prophylactics_, entirely warding off and preventing fevers, or at least arresting them at the premonitory stage.

_Podophyllin_ is a most valuable remedy for headache.

Nose Bleed--Epistaxis.

If it arises from fullness of the vessels of the head, with throbbing of the temples, redness of the face and eyes, _Belladonna_ is the remedy.

If fever is present, _Aconite_ must be alternated with _Bell._

In females or children who have habitual nose-bleed, _Pulsatilla_ and _Podophyllin_ are to be used alternately, night and morning. During the paroxysm of bleeding, _Arnica_ should be used, one dose repeated in a half hour if it continues.

If it is produced by over-exertion, _Rhus_ is the proper remedy. If it occurs in the _early stage_ of fever, _Aconite_ and _Bell._; in the latter stage, _Rhus_ and _Phos._ are to be used. _Hamamelis_ will frequently arrest nose-bleed _immediately_ after one or two doses.

Worms.

It is difficult to determine the presence of _worms_ in children, much more in adults, yet both are affected by them occasionally. In children, there is more or less fever and restlessness, screaming out in sleep, starting, pain in the bowels, vomiting, choking, diarrhoea, picking at the nose, fetid breath, voracious and variable appet.i.te.

TREATMENT.

_Santonine_ is a remedy which I have used for years, and I have treated many hundreds of cases, with such unvariable success, that I feel disinclined to use or to recommend any other. It brings away the worms entire, and relieves the patient of all morbid symptoms immediately, or in much less time than any other remedy of which I have any knowledge.

It seems to act specifically upon the worms, causing them to leave the bowels by being evacuated with the feces, without producing any sensible impression upon the bowels, the evacuations remaining natural, if they were so, or becoming so, if deranged, and the worms coming away not quite lifeless.

I have often prescribed this remedy for children suffering under intermittent or remitting, and even typhoid fever, in the summer season, when there were not present any well defined symptoms of worms, and yet the fever would soon abate, and in due time worms appear in the fecal evacuations. It often arrests entirely intermittent fever, when worms are present, and are the probable cause of the fever.

I give either the crude salt in from one-fourth to one-half grain doses, or a trituration of one grain to four of sugar, giving in the latter case, from one to two grains of the trituration. Give one dose at bed-time, or in an urgent case at any other time, but never repeat the dose under thirty-six hours, and in an ordinary case, under forty-eight hours.

This is _the_ medicine _par excellence_ for worms. It may be repeated once a week, when there is a tendency in the patient to the development of worm symptoms, or, in other words, the breeding of worms. The idea held out by some that it is hurtful, or unimportant to remove the worms, in itself considered, is simply _nonsense_, and _worse_, for children are sometimes sacrificed to this idea.

Earache--Otalgia.

This may arise from various causes, but a common one is sudden cold. If it arises from cold, and there is general fever, or if the ear is red, or the side of the head and ear hot, _Bell._ and _Baptisia_ should be given in alternation, every hour, or in a violent case, more frequently.

These remedies will soon relieve such cases. Cloths wrung out of hot water should be laid over the ear, or the side of the head steamed, or it may be laid into water quite warm, with good effect.

Where the disease is a chronic affection, and the patient is subject to frequent attacks of pain in the ear, especially on a change of the weather, from dry to moist, _Mercurius_ is the proper remedy, especially if it is worse at night, when warm in bed.

If it arises from a shock or blow, _Arn_. is to be used. In scrofulous persons, whether there is ulceration or not, _Phosphorus_ and _Pulsatilla_ are the remedies.

Children and even adults, not unfrequently suffer from earache, without any known cause sufficient to account for it. On examination into the ear you will often find either the cavity filled or nearly so, with a hard black substance, (the insp.i.s.sated ”earwax”) almost as hard as horn, or else the ear will be quite empty, and the sides of the cavity _dry_ and red, though perhaps not properly in a state of inflammation.

The natural condition of the cavity as it can be seen by straining the ear outwards and backwards a little in a strong sun light, is moist, the surface covered slightly with a yellowish, greasy, soft substance (the cerumen) ”earwax.” When this is wanting or in excess, or its character changed, it is evidence of disease, and pain is likely to occur. The

TREATMENT