: In cholera morbuswith gushing, watery
stools and copious vomiting, the stomach and bowels are emptied of their contents. The
patient is fairly emptied out, becomes blue all over, the extremities are cold, there is
jerking of the muscles, cramping of the extremities and of the fingers and toes, spasms of
the chest; he is cold, mottled, blue in blotches, going into collapse; the finger nails and
toe nails and the hands and feet are blue.
There are several remedies that look like Cuprum in such a
condition. In cholera we would naturally hunt for such remedies as produce cholera-like
discharges, more or less spasmodic conditions, the great blueness, coldness, sinking and
collapse.
We would here refer to Hahnemann's observation. Hahnemann had
not seen a case of cholera, but he perceived that the disease produced appearances
resembling the symptoms of Cuprum, Camphorand Veratrum. He saw from the description of the disease that the
general aspect of cholera was like the general aspect of Cuprum, Camphor and Veratrum, and these three remedies are the typical cholera remedies.
They all have the general feature of cholera, its nature and general
aspect. They all have the exhaustive vomiting and diarrhoea, the coldness, the tendency to
collapse, the sinking from the emptying out of the fluids of the body.
From what I have said you will see that the Cuprum case is,
above all others, the spasmodiccase. It has the most intense spasms, and the spasms being the leading
feature, they overshadow all the other symptoms of the case.
He is full of cramps and is compelled to cry out with the pain from the
contractions of the muscles. Camphor is the coldest of all the three remedies; the Camphor patient iscold as death. Camphorhas the blueness,
the exhaustive discharge, though less than Cuprum and Veratrum;
but whereas in the two latter remedies the patient is willing to be covered up, in Camphorhe wants the windows
open and wants to be cool.
Though he is cold he wants to be uncovered and to have the windows open.
But just here let me mention another feature in Camphor. It has also some convulsions which are painful, and when the pain is onhe wants to be
covered up and wants the windows shut. If there are cramps in the bowels with the pain, be
wants to be covered up.
So that in Camphor, during all of its complaints in febrile conditions (and fever is very rare
in Camphor), and
during the pains he wants to be covered up and warm, but during the coldnesshe wants to be
uncovered and have the air.
In cholera, then, the extreme coldness and blueness point to Camphor.
Again, with Camphorthere are often scanty as well as copious discharges, so that the cholera
patient is often taken so suddenly that he has the coldness, blueness and exhaustion and
almost no vomiting or diarrhoea, a condition called dry cholera. It simply means an uncommonly small amount of vomiting
and diarrhoea.
This is Camphor. Another prominent feature is the great coldness of the body without the
usual sweat that belongs to the disease. Cuprum
and Veratrum have the cold
clammy sweat, and Camphoralso has sweat, but more commonly the patient needing Camphoris very cold,
blue and dryand wants
to be uncovered. That is striking.
Now we go to Veratrumand see that we can have three remedies very much alike, and so perfectly
adapted to cholera and yet so different. Veratrum is peculiar because of its copious exhaustive discharges, copious sweat,
copious discharges from the bowels, copious vomiting, and great coldness of the sweat. There
is some cramping and he wants to be warm; he is ameliorated by hot drinks, and by the
application of hot bottles which relieve pain and suffering.
These three remedies tend downward into collapse and death. Now to
repeat: Cuprum for the cases of a convulsivecharacter, Camphorin cases characterized by extreme coldnessand more or less dryness, and Veratrumwhen the copious
sweat, vomiting and purging are the features. That is little to remember, but with that you
can enter an epidemic of cholera with confidence.
In cholera-like states there are other remedies which relate to Cuprum and which ought to be considered. Podophyllumhas cramps, mainly in the bowels. It has a painless,
gushing diarrhea with vomiting as well, and hence is useful in cholera morbus.
The cramps in Podophyllum, are violent, they feel to him as if the intestines were being tied in knots.
The watery stool is yellow, and, if examined a little while after, it looks as if corn meal
had been stirred into it. The odor is dreadful, smelling like a Podophyllum, stool. If you say it smells like stinking meat that
only partly describes it; it is not quite cadaveric but it is horribly offensive and
penetrating.
The stool is gushing, copious, and is accompanied by dreadful exhaustion.
"It is a wonder where it can all come from," says the mother, speaking of the exhausting diarrhea
in an infant or in a child. The stool runs away gushingly, in prolonged squirts, with a
sensation of emptiness, sinking, deathly goneness in the whole abdomen. Phosphorusalso ought to be
thought of in relation to Cuprum. It also has cramps in the bowels, exhaustive
diarrhea, a, sinking as if dying, but commonly with heat of the skin, with burning
internally, with gurgling of all the fluids taken into the stomach; as soon as they come to
the stomach they commence to gurgle, and gurgle all the way through the bowel.
A drink of water seems to, flow through the bowel with a gurgle. Now this
gurgling in Cuprum commences at the throat; he swallows with a gurgle;
gurgling in the oesophagus when swallowing.
Convulsive cramps all over the body with twitching, jerking, trembling
and blueness of the skin. Everything he does, all his actions are spasmodic, are convulsive.
All the sphincters are convulsive, All the activities are irregular, disorderly and
convulsive when poisoned with copper.
Bear these things in mind as we study every region in Cuprum. Repression or driving in of eruptions, attended with diarrhoea and
convulsions, sometimes only convulsions. We note a case of measles or scarlet fever with a
rash that has been suppressed by a chill or exposure to wind and convulsions have come on.
That belongs to Zincum
and Cuprum, sometimes to Bryonia, but to Zincum and Cuprum particularly. Twitching of the limbs from a sudden suppression of a scarlet
fever, with suppression of urine, chorea, etc.
Cramping of the muscles of the chest; cramping of the calves; cramp ing
all over. Suppressed eruptions. Discharges that have been in existence quite a long time.
The individual has become debilitated and worn out with excitement, but this discharge
barely kept him alive. He has gradually grown weaker, but he has kept about because he had a
discharge.
It has furnished him a safety-valve, If stopped suddenly convulsions will
come on. That is like Cuprum. A woman has suffered a long time with a copious
leucorrhoea and some unwise doctor tells her she must take injections and she checks it up
for a few days, hysterical convulsions, crampings and tearings of the muscles come on;
contractions of the fingers and toes. Discharges from old ulcers, fistulae suppressed.
Cuprum will
re-establish a discharge that has been suddenly suppressed and convulsions followed. It
stops the convulsions and reestablishes the discharge. It has caries, it has senile
gangrene, or the gangrene that belongs to old age; old shriveled up octogenarians, whose
toes and fingers get dark in spots; feeble circulation.
