NAT. ORD., Euphorbiaceae.
COMMON NAME, Indian Acalypha, Indian Nettle.
PREPARATION.--The fresh plant is macerated with two parts by weight of
alcohol.
(Dr. Tonnere, of Calcutta, India, seems to have been the
first to call attention to this plant as a remedy. In a
small work, _Additions to the Homoeopathic Materia
Medica_, collected and arranged by Henry Thomas, M. D.,
and published in London in the year 1858, appears the
following credited to that physician.)
Tincture of the _Acalypha Indica_, prepared and administered in the
sixth decimal dilution, is specific in haemorrhage from the lungs. In
three cases in which I have employed it, the persons were affected with
phthisis. In one case there was a tuberculous affection of the upper
portion of the left lung, of some two years' standing. Haemoptysis had
been going on for three months; the expectoration had been in the
morning pure blood; in the evening dark lumps of clotted blood, and the
fits of coughing were very violent at night. In this case all
homoeopathic remedies had been tried unsuccessfully, when I
accidentally discovered the virtues of the _Acalypha Indica_, that
remedy having been given me by a native for jaundice. I prepared the
mother tincture upon the homoeopathic principle, and took 10 drops,
which brought on a severe fit of dry cough, followed by spitting of
blood. Having noted all the symptoms experienced by myself, and finding
that they were nearly all similar to those of my patients, I gave six
drops 6th [decimal] dilution in half a tumbler of water, a spoonful to
be taken every half hour, beginning immediately (9 A.M.). At 6 P.M., the
blood stopped. I continued this for eight days, and the blood has never
reappeared (now three months since). The patient is improving, and
auscultation proves the disease has decreased, and I am in hopes to
affect a cure, yet one month since I have been giving them the medicine
they have not spit any blood, although previously one of them never
passed a day without spitting a great quantity. _Calcarea carb._ is an
antidote to the _Acalypha_.
Another transatlantic medical friend writes:--"I hope you obtained some
of the _Acalypha Indica_ while you were here. I have found it perfectly
successful in arresting haemoptysis in three cases of consumption in the
last stage; I could not perceive any other effect from its use, but the
cessation of the hemorrhagic sputa was, I think, a great advantage."
Its use in my hands has been very satisfactory, but I have only tried it
in similar cases to those already cited. The first instance of my using
it--in a hopeless case of phthisis--a continued and wearisome haemoptysis
succumbed to its exhibition, and quiet sleep succeeded its use--the
patient eventually died of pulmonary paralysis.
In a case of passive haemorrhage from the lungs, after _Arnica_ was used
with little benefit, _Acalypha_ benefited, and then failed; after which
the use of _Arnica_ entirely stayed the haemorrhagic flow. (Perhaps
_Hamamelis_ would have at once cured, but it was not at hand.)[A]
[A] Homoeopathic Review, vol. 1, p. 256.
K., a phthisical patient, had haemoptysis to a considerable extent; in a
short time his voice failed him; he took half-drop doses of 7th
[decimal] dilution of _Acalypha_ in water every half hour, and in a few
hours the blood spitting left him entirely.
(In 1885 Dr. Peter Cooper, of Wilmington, Delaware, read
a paper on the drug _Acalypha Indica_ of which the
following is an abstract:)
Professor Jones recapitulates as follows: "_Time._ Haemorrhage occurs in
morning. _Blood._ Bright-red and not profuse in morning; dark and
clotted in afternoon. _Pulse._ Neither quickened nor hard; rather soft
and easily compressible. _Cough._ Violent and in fits at night; patient
has a played-out feeling in the morning and gains in strength as the day
advances.
"_N. B._--Worthy of trial in all pathological haemorrhages having notedly
a morning exacerbation."
Such is an outline presentation of the drug given us by so eminent an
authority as Professor Jones, of the University of Michigan. It was his
"N. B.," his suggestion that _Acalypha_ was worthy of trial in all
pathological haemorrhages from any source, providing the morning
aggravation was present, that fixed my attention upon the drug
especially. At the time I had a case of haemorrhage per rectum that had
baffled me for several months. No remedy had aided the case in the
least, so far as I could see, unless it was Pond's Extract used locally
in the form of injection; and I finally came to the conclusion that the
relief apparently due to the _Hamamelis_ was merely a coincidence. I had
given all the haemorrhagic remedies I knew of or could hear of. Still the
bleeding came just as often, with increasing severity. Each time the
patient was sure she would "bleed to death," and I was not positive she
would be disappointed. In fact, I was so hopeless that I used to delay
the answer to her summons as long as possible, so that the bleeding
might have time to exhaust itself. She became reduced in flesh and the
haemorrhagic drugs became reduced in number, until like the nine little
Indians sitting on a gate the last one tumbled off and then there was
none. As soon as I read Dr. Jones' monograph on _Acalypha Indica_, I
determined to try it. She had all the symptoms--bright-red blood in the
morning; dark and clotted in the afternoon and evening; weak and languid
in the forenoon, stronger during the afternoon--except one, _i.e._,
instead of the blood coming from the lungs it came from within the
portals of the anus. I procured the 6x dil. and served it in water. It
gave speedy, almost immediate relief. Each subsequent attack came less
profuse and at longer intervals. She has not had a haemorrhage now for
two months, while before she was having from seven to one (continuous) a
week. She is gaining in flesh, is in every way improved, and keeps
_Acalypha Indica_ constantly by her.