REMEDIES FOR THE EMERGENCY KIT

Bacillinum

  Very useful remedy for all convalescents, for patients with frequent relapses.  You are called again to the bedside of your patient, your last remedy helped, but again a relapse.  It’s no use repeating the remedy if it has been prescribed two or three times for a bad cold, you have to administer Bacillinum.  Bacillinum is the trituration of the material of a tuberculous cavity.  As a rule the 30^th C.H. is the most successful dose.  Add it, in KENT’s Repertory, p. 1349, to the rubric “tendency to take colds”.  It is a good remedy for light coughs with easy expectoration (not for the sticky, hard to detach sputum) -- so add it to p.815 to the rubric “expectoration easy”.

  It is also good for pityriasis or lice (p.129).  Think of it for these very deep headaches, worse from motion. Bacillinum does work in conditions where allopathic drugs are totally ineffective, such as eczematous marginal blepharitis: for these patients with crusty, itchy eyelids (p. 239, eruptions, lids on, eczema, margins on ).  Give the 30^th C.H. every 8 days for 1-2 months.

Baptisia tinctoria

  This is the remedy for infant’s stomatitis.  Infantile diarrhoea, especially if putrid.  Baptisia is usually indicated for severe grippe or flu, with profound prostration and sensation of body soreness. 

Patients complain mainly of being tired, especially in the neck, unable to find a comfortable place on the pillow.  Remember that they generally complain, in all febrile diseases, of excess heat in the neck, they don’t know what to do to get cooled; there is a simple way, put a cotton towel back of the head and pull it right or left when hot.

  The typical Baptisia patient looks besotted, stupefied and lachrymose.  Headaches with sore throat with deep putrid ulcerations.  Strange to say, Baptisia sore throats are hardly painful inspite of these deep ulcerations.  Same thing with Lachesis.  On the contrary, if the patient complains of atrocious pains in the throat, and, on examination, there isn’t much to see, that is Belladonna.  Baptisia characteristic: can swallow only liquids, the opposite of Lachesis and Merc-cor. where swallowing fluids is almost impossible for the pains.

  In whatever position lain on, the parts feel very sore, the same with Pyrogenium and Arnica which have the same characteristic of being unable to find a comfortable position in bed.  Baptisia has a stuporous state with the typical characteristic that the patient answers correctly when talked to, then falls back suddenly in his stupor; he listens, he understands, he answers.  Two other remedies have this same symptoms:  Arnica and Hyoscyamus.

  Certain patients have the sensation of the body being double. Three remedies present the same symptom; Anacardium, Nux moschata and Stramonium, together with Baptisia and Petroleum, and there are a few remedies in the first degree.

  These patients suffer from insomnia and their limbs, mostly the legs, seem to be separated from the trunk, or their limbs don’t belong to them.  These things are very odd; he says: “my leg is talking with my left hand,” and he feels that his limbs are scattered in the bed.  In these acute cases, give and repeat the 200^th.

  The limbs are not only scattered on the bed, but he tries to put them together though unsuccessfully.  Besides Baptisia, this symptom is found also in Phosphorus and Petroleum:

  great sleepiness with very heavy eyelids,

  the head feels enlarged.

  These patients have, like Cuprum, frontal headaches at the root of the nose.  These little symptoms are really good to know in acute cases.  Parosmia: the patient perceives an odor of burned feathers; this odor is very characteristic of this remedy.  They also have an awful sensation of a hole, of emptiness in the stomach; they suffer of mericysm, i.e. regurgitations of food.  As inDulcamara, it has an autumnal dysentry, or in warm weather.  It is a very useful remedy, almost specific, for threatening abortion following a moral depression, or a shock from bad news.  The remedy closest to Baptisia is Echinacea.  It is a psoric of short action but indicated mostly by septic condition of fast pace.

Baryta carbonica

  It fits patients catching cold at the least pretext, and mostly sore throats; for childrean with sore throat due to cold, and able to swallow  liquids only, like Baptisia.  When one feels, deep in the pharynx, a little bar with a dry painful feeling, worse swallowing especially food, one single dose of Baryta carbonica 200.... one hour later it is all over, gone.  Sore throats due to cold.  Coryza with swelling of the upper lip; Dr. NEBEL—I don’t know why—used to call it: the pig’s lip.... mostly in children with big tummies.

  It is an excellent remedy for tonsil hypertrophy and all acute inflammations of the throat, especially if there is a tendency to quinsy.  All acute tonsillitis due to cold or following the suppression of foot sweats.  Dysphagia, difficult deglutition especially when swallowing empty.  These patients can only swallow liquids, and the external throat is painful to touch or palpation.  The Baryta carbonica pains are mostly burning.  When somebody tells you: “Doctor, I think I am going to have an angina, because, last night, I woke up several times, with burning pains in my throat”, you can be sure it is Baryta carb.:  Burning pains in the throat at night points to Baryta carb.: in the 3^rd degree in the Repertory.

  In women a very useful symptom:  Epistaxis before menstruation.

  It is a remedy for adenitis, of all sorts, particularly for occipadenitis.  Also indicated in parotiditis, inflammation of the sub-maxillary glands, painful and swollen.  This remedy has a strange parosmia: the odor of pine smoke.  Children refuse to play, like Rheum.  Children hate strangers, they are shy and hide when an unknown person enters the house.  They are timid, fearful, cowards, they hide behind the furniture; they cover their face with their hands and look between their fingers: this is a typical attitude of Baryta carb.

  These children have unfortunately a very poor memory, they learn with great difficulty, and are always the last ones at school.

  Salivation during sleep, like Mercurius.

  Loss of voice or hoarseness due to cough.

  Sensation of smoke in the chest, as if the lungs were full of smoke.  Excellent remedy for choking catarrh with pulmonary paralysis in old people, especially if obese, hypertensive, with suffocating cough, with chest full of mucus and rales; they cannnot expectorate; in such cases it is not Antimonium but Baryta carb.

  Spasmodic cough by tickling in the throat or in the pit of the stomach.  Many believe that only Sepia or Bryonia are indicated for this symptom and so forget that Baryta carb., fits very well.  Coughs aggravated evening until midnight, often in patients with cold feet or after suppression of perspiration.  Well indicated also in intertrigo, between the thighs and scrotum like Hepar, Sulphur, and sometimes Thuja.

Belladonna

  It is the remedy of hypersensitivity, turgescence and violence, all three major indications of Belladonna.  Hypersensitivity to light.  The Belladonna patient is always sensitive to light; photophobia—to the least noise; he hates any noise, any motion or jar.  As you enter the room and come to the crib or bed give a little jar to it and see how the child reacts: if he startles, it is already an indication for Belladonna, especially if light bothers.  These same symptoms apply to grownups as well.

  Turgescence - when there is heat, redness and tumefaction, with a burning skin, a burning head with cold extremities.

  Belladonna eyes are generally red, the face scarlet.  In case of breast  inflammation, for  example, you will see red streaks radiating from the inflammatory focus along the lymphatics.  The throat is red, with dysphagia.  EVERYTHING IS RED IN BELLADONNA:  The eyes, the skin . . . everything . . . even the mood.  It is for that reason that it is the remedy of Scarlatina, the smooth kind not the granular one, and HAHNEMANN insists much about the difference of these 2 forms.  It is also a prophylactic of the smooth type of Scarlatina;  if there is a case in the family, give Belladonna 200 to the whole  family, morning and evening for 2 days, you’ll find it an excellent prophylactic. A definite characteristic is the throbbing of the carotid arteries, also the temporal. Everything pulses and throbs. The pains are throbbing, pulsating like the heart, also burning, stabbing pains.

  Violence - These patients are perfectly normal in their life, but when sick become very disagreeable and violent.  Everything comes and goes suddenly: a nephrotic colic, for example.  It starts suddenly, might last for a while, but disappears quickly.  The same with Chamomila, the  remedy of  children where everything appears and disappears suddenly.  The child cries before the whooping cough attack.  You often hear say that when there are tears with cough that Natrum mur., is the remedy, in reality, that means lachrymation, which is involuntary and not crying which is voluntary.

  Perspiration on covered parts only.  Convulsions with fever during dentition, to be differentiated with Magnesia phos which has convulsions without fever.  Rage fits, disposition to bite, to tear, to hit and to spit on surrounding objects or even persons.  When the face is pale and suddenly reddens, but there are many remedies having this symptom such as Aconite, Ferrum, Lac caninum.  The patient with very noisy fits of laughter, also the sardonic type which is awful to see.  When delirious, the patient wants to escape and go back home, like Bryonia.

  The mouth is dry with thirst, like Bryonia and Natrum mur.  In children, the tongue hangs out, swollen, thick, scarlet, completely dry.  It is also one of the main remedies for children who grind teeth particularly if affected with obstinate constipation.  Pain at the appendix region, at the least touch; cannot stand the weight of the covers.  We have some remarkable remedies for this right lower quadrant region.  For the appendix, a good local and reliable remedy: Iris tenax.  If you get very definite symptoms, you of course prescribe the corresponding remedy which often is Bryonia.  But don’t forget Iris tenax.  If the patient has had already several remedies, complains of fatigue and constant pains, don’t forget Arnica which can be very helpful.  Even yesterday, I saw a patient with abdominal pains and a high temperature, who immediately improved with Arnica 200K.  But if the patient cannot stand the weight of the covers and is worse from the least contact or touch, think of Belladonna.

  It is the remedy of the head, par excellence.  The routinists invariably give Belladonna for a headache, Nux vomica for the stomach and Arsenicum for the intestines ...

  If the odor of tobacco is intolerable and produces headaches, think of Belladonna.  The eyes are always burning and the pupils dilated.  It is very rare indeed to see serious cases of Belladonna with contracted pupils.  Boring of the head into the pillow; in whooping cough, the child cries before the fit.  It is one of the remedies for airsickness, with Coca.  Calcarea is the great remedy for mountain sickness, but not for air sickness.

  In Belladonna, the laterality is right, typical for most of its ailments.  Aggravated at 3 p.m.  Hours of aggravations are important.  ForBryonia, it is 9 p.m.  A neuralgia, a whooping cough, a diarrhoea, a convulsion worse at 3 p.m. require Belladonna.

  Worse from cold applications and cold in general;  the opposite of Ledum.  Worse from sleep: the opposite of Phosphorus.  Particularly cannot take a siesta in the afternoon, because he always feels worse for it.  Cannot stand drafts.  Each time he has his hair cut or washed, he gets a cold.  Give him a dose of Belladonna before going to the barber and there will be no cold.

  Worse lying, especially lying on the affected side, however there is no improvement lying on the other side.  Worse drinking, when touched, from the sun and light.  They want to keep in the dark.  Worse walking in the wind, especially the north cold wind.  Worse from eating sausages, hot dogs.  Belladonna is sleepy yet cannot sleep.  Indicated in children especially those with a large head.  When touching a Belladonna child, you’ll feel not only the heat of the skin, but after taking away your hand the impression of heat persists.  Where does animal heat come from?  The Hindus claim that it comes from the 3^rd chakra.  The first chakra is anal, the anus meaning elimination, it is Shiva, the destructor (Muladhara chakra).  The 2^nd chakra is genital, the 3^rd umbilical: when meditating on that chakra one meditates on animal heat.  Indeed our heat is elaborated in the intestines due to the activity of all the saprophytes germs.

  In febrile conditions, the child bores his head backward on the pillow, or rolls it from side to side.  The child has a fixed, piercing, fiery look, the face is red, pupils dilated.  Any motion aggravates.  The child refuses to be brushed or combed, the girls leave their hair hanging, and refuse to be touched, or brushed, as it is painful.  You find a temporary strabismus in severe conditions; strabismus during fever.  If the patient asks for a lemon during fever, think of Belladonna.  Constrictions everywhere: in the throat, uterus, liver and anus.  As you can see, Belladonna is a remarkable polychrest which will achieve splendid cures if you know and remember all the characteristics.

Bellis perennis

  That’s the little daisy; a most remarkable drug, almost forgotten, a vulnerary.  That’s the remedy for traumas, bruises, ecchymoses as Arnica.  Whereas Arnica is aggravated by touch or pressure, Bellis is rather ameliorated.  This is the typical remedy for a woman who hits her breasts by pulling a drawer, and later on a nodule or tumor develops.  Breast nodule following a trauma, it is a specific, more effective than Conium.

  This is the remedy to prescribe following any important surgical procedure: laparotomy, a thoracic or brain operation; it can be administered even before the intervention, as a prophylactic.  It is also the remedy following falls on the coccyx, as Hypericum andSilica, which are also well indicated.  In such cases, the X-ray will show a light luxation of the coccyx which, sometimes, can be relieved by a simple manual reduction.  I take this opportunity to give you a psychological advice.  Whenever you do a digital examination, please take it easy; I am appalled to see how inhuman and cruel the physicians can be... he should be submitted to the same rough handling and find out for himself how really painful this is.  Always lubricate the finger, then approach the finger gradually without penetrating, then press gently, and, if there is any resistance wait a few seconds.  Do get in only when the finger is accepted without resistance, this way you will never hurt.  You can dilate somewhat the sphincter before going deeper.  Easy, gently... you’ll find the patient grateful.  Bellis perennis is also the remedy for sprains, muscular and tendinous.  It is the rival of Ruta.

  If during the summer, you have a patient who got overheated and drank cold or iced drinks, Bellis is very good to avoid complications of 3 different kinds: headaches, vomitting, diarrhoea, Bellis doesn’t like cold, nor water, shower, cold baths, likeSulphur and Belladonna.  As the latter, it has mydriasis.  During pregnancy, it is useful for varices.  Also good for painful furuncles and acne.

  Whereas Belladonna has the right laterality, Bellis has the left one, however if it is the right breast that was traumatized, you can very well prescribe Bellis just the same.  It is better to take it in the morning as it is apt to produce insomnia with a 3 a.m. awakening, or later with no chance to fall asleep anymore.  In the repertory, p.1134 to the rubric “pain as if sprained” you should add Bellis perennis.  And I advise you to add too, for chronic sprains, chronic pains following ankle sprains, or the tendency to turn your ankles any time: Strontium carbonicum.  For chronic sprains give one dose of the 200^th once a week.  In acute cases, give it daily.  I usually prescribe the 10M the first day, also the next day, then a 50M, the third day, one dose.  When complicated with inflammation, I prefer one dose of the 200^th every two hours.  Remember to keep the patient busy in acute cases and give them their remedy in one glass, and placebo in another and alternate every hour or every 2 hours. An acute patient needs something hourly.  I remember a 45 year old clerk who sawed wood all afternoon, and his right arm became paralysed completely.  Bellis 10M, one dose, cured him in 24 hours.

Berberis

  There are two Berberis:  Berberis vulgaris and Berberis aquifolia. We use Berberis vulgaris.  It is the drug for the back, the kidney and the liver.  It is a superb remedy for lumbago, especially lumbosacral lumbago with intense fatigue in that area, worse sitting or lying.  Usually these pains are caused by jars and worse by motion, walking, better when standing. Characteristic for this remedy are radiating pains, waist radiating or down the legs.  For the kidney it is indicated for renal colic with stabbing, stitching, lancinating pains, always radiating from the back in all directions, but mostly down, most often accompanied by the urge to urinate.  Books mention either the right or the left laterality; I have told you before that for renal calculi the question of laterality is unimportant, you can forget it.  Berberis works well on either side.  It has a peculiar boiling pain, like a boiling in the lumbar region.

  While urinating, there are pains in the groins and thighs.  The urine is always dark and putrid, the opposite of Gelsemium the urine of which is aqueous, like clear water.

  Berberis is also a remedy for the liver and gallbladder.  Hepatic colics radiating to the left shoulder, added indication: jaundice with clayey stools.  Gnawing pains in the epigastrium, on the right side with shooting pains in the left shoulder blade.  Also radiation from the 10^th rib to the umbilicus.

  Great remedy for dysmenorrhea, when the pains radiate in every direction and mostly in the thighs.  The body is cold with a warm face; chills and fever at 11 a.m. Patient is apathetic with dark circles around the eyes.  (Dr.CANTEGRIT):  Usually in nephrotic colic, the pains radiate rather up than down.  Furthermore, when the urine shows red deposits adherent to the bottom, Berberis’ urine has a dissolving power which cleans the vessel.

Bismuthum subnitricum

  That’s the remedy for gastralgia and cardialgia of a cramp-like character.  Bismuth has all imaginable stomach pains: burning, pulling, twitching, cramping, etc., worse when gagging.  These pains are sometimes accompained by tremblings, even fainting.  Headaches alternating with gastralgia.  These patients have awful pains with convulsive efforts to vomit after laparotomy; of course one thinks of Bellis perennis, but when the patient is beset with gagging, the allopath administers morphine, but you’ll give Bismuth200 and you’ll be surprised that the patient won’t need morphine.

  These patients, like Dioscorea, are better when leaning backward in opisthotonos, never forward like Colocynthis.  They are intensely thirsty with vomiting immediately after drinking, like Phosphorus.  They vomit not only the water but solid food as well; but the water comes up immediately, solid food a little later, unlike Phosphorus.

  It is the remedy for children who are terrified of being alone, who grab their mother’s skirts and never let go.  It is also the remedy for toothache better from cold drinks which they keep in their mouth, but as soon as the water warms up, the pains return.

Bufo rana

  This is a remedy less frequently used, yet you must know it and keep it in the kit.  This remedy is sometimes found under the name of “Bufones” as it applies to different kinds of frogs and toads.  We usually use Bufo rana, and there is also Bufo cinereus but rarely used.

  It is one of the main remedies for epileptic fits, mostly nocturnal, during sleep.  In the course of treatment of an epileptic patient suffering of diurnal epilepsy, you might observe, under the influence of our remedies, that the fits become nocturnal, it is a good sign meaning a possible cure.  Also if the fits change into absences.  It is the remedy for epilepsy worse during menses; when the lunation changes; after a dental extraction; after a suppuration; in patients suffering from violent headaches on waking.

  I had once a patient who had fits during intercourse.  No doubt it is a rare situation, nevertheless very embarrassing ...  But think ofBufo in such cases  as it has a specific action on the genital sphere.

  In cases of convulsions, it is very useful to know what happens before, during and after the fit.  The premonitory symptoms are for us really precious.

  Before convulsions, Bufo has markedly dilated pupils, and if you have the luck to be there at that time, you will find that the pupillary reflex is abolished.  The right eye is usually wide open while the left one is closed.  The eyes look up and the mouth opens, while the patient jabbers indistinctly.  The convulsions start often in the face which is contorted.

  During the convulsions, you can see a bloody saliva oozing from the mouth; the patient bites his tongue, has involuntary urination; the thumb is drawn into the palm; the patient is drenched in perspiration; the limbs are cold and the head and face warm.  When you have a patient with cold feet, cold extremities, always look if the head is hot or cold.  Arnica is also a remedy with a warm head and face and cold extremities.  Bufo often has convulsions without consciousness, either tonic or clonic.

  Bufo is also a good remedy for haematuria during parturition.

  It is a great remedy for Sciatica

  Finally it is a remedy that has given me wonderful results in septic lymphangitis, with red streaks and swelling from the wound to the adenopathy.  I have seen the spectacular cure of a patient who had a lacerated finger followed by an increasing fever and lymphatics beautifully outlined on her arm.  One dose of Bufo 200, and everything settled back in order within a few hours.  This remedy acts with great rapidity.

  It is a remedy to be considered in cancer of the lips, mostly ulcerated, and also in cancer of the breast.

  In case of anthrax, it is a very precious remedy when the usual red areola is lacking, but a blue one is there instead.  Think of this remedy also in the beginning of a panaritium.

Cactus grandiflorus.

  One can synthetize this remedy  in one word; Constriction.  It is rare to prescribe Cactus unless there is constriction somewhere.  These patients are easily affected with violent congestions, which in plethorics often lead to haemorrhages.  These patients have a red face.  Sanguine apoplexy (Aconite) with localized pulsations, on the epigastrium, for example.

  Fear of death, even more pronounced than in Aconite.  The patient thinks that he is incurable, as Arsenicum.  It is a brillant remedy for haemorrhages: of the nose, the lung, the stomach, the rectum, the bladder.  Yet don’t forget Crotalus cascavella, Millefolium andPhosphorus.

  With Cactus you have a remedy for patients who cry and yell from the pain.

  Headaches like a  heavy load on the vertex, better by pressing over it (Menyanthes or buck bean, Alumen, Cina and Veratrum).  Menopausal cephalalgia, as with Glonoine and Lachesis.  Congestive periodical neuralgias and cephalalgia, mostly of the right laterality, throbbing and always intense.

  Sensation of the body being locked up in a tightening iron cage, as if being crushed by this constriction.  This symptom is absolutely typical of Cactus which is the remedy of all constrictions; these patients have to loosen up their clothing as soon as they get home.  Constriction of the throat, of the chest, the ribs, the heart, the bladder, the rectum, the uterus, the vagina, and often provoked by the slightest contact.  These patients complain of oppression, as from a great weight on the chest (what the Germans call Alpendruck).  Sensation in the inferior  thorax as if a rope tightening the diaphragm, impeding its expansion.  Sensation as if an iron hand clutches the heart with alternating release, this becomes unbearable to the patient.  As if the heart had not enough room to beat.  At the same time there is numbness in the left arm with tingling in the fingers; this symptom is also found in Latrodectus.

  Cactus patients have day and night palpitations, worse walking, worse  lying  on the left side as in Lachesis.  Pain in the heart at the beginning of menses.  It is the remedy for endocarditis with mitral insufficiency, accompanied by violent palpitations.  Pains wherever they might occur, are fulgurating, like stabbing, coming and going.

  The menstrual flow, in Cactus, stops as soon the patient reclines as in Bovista  and Causticum.  It is an interesting symptom for the homœopathic physician even if it cannot be explained. 

  Generally the Cactus menses are dark, thick clots.

  The Cactus fever is intermittent.  It might have a regular periodicity  everyday at the same hour; the characteristic hour is 11 p.m. and 11 a.m.  Fever at 11 a.m. and 11 p.m. with anguish and  dyspnoea.

  The Cactus patient is pulseless, breathless, without strength and often without temperature.  Hypothermia - A warm head with cold extremities, mostly the feet.  During mental exertion, like preparing for a test, the head is too warm.

  -Journal of the American Institute of  Homœopathy, March 1971.

(Translated from the Proceedings of the Groupement Hahnemannien De Lyon;  7^th Series, 1, p.18 by Roger SCHMIDT.MD.  San Francisco,  California.)