Coccus Cacti

" Cochineal consists of the dried female insects, which are about one or two lines long, wrinkled, of an irregular figure, convex on one side and flat or somewhat hollow on the other. They are in- odorous, have a bitterish warm taste, tinge the saliva violet-red, and yield a dark-red powder. In burning, they evolve an animal odor, and leave a grayish-white ash. By infusion in water they swell up, show their ringed character and even their feet, giving the liquid a red color."

We make a tincture of cochineal by macerating one part of the fine powder in eight parts of pure alcohol for eight days or a fort- night, after which the solution is strained, subjected to a press, and filtered. Triturations with sugar of milk may likewise be made.

In spite of Pereira's denial of the therapeutic virtues of cochineal as a diuretic agent, it has, nevertheless, proved useful in diseases of the urinary organs in the hands of the empirists of Kademacher's school. Rademacher ranks it among his " Organmittel," (organ remedies) ; he regards the kidneys as its principal sphere of action. It has rendered good service in some of the most important func- tional as well as organic renal diseases. We will illustrate its action by a few clinical cases.

ANASARCA AND ALBUMINURIA.—

A robust laborer, twenty-five years old, was received in the Berlin Charite on the 7th of August. He had been sick for eight days, chilliness alternating with heat, lassitude, weary and sore feeling in the limbs, headache; in a few days the limbs and the extremities began to swell; he complained of backache, and passed much less urine than usual; anasarca and ascites were fully developed on his entering the hospital; skin hot and dry, pulse one hundred ; urine turbid, containing much albumen ; bowels constipated.

Took digitalis without any diminution of the dropsy. On the 1 2th took coccionella, four powders a day, five grains each, to ten grains of loaf sugar. On the 20th the dropsy was much less, the albumen decreased more and more ; on the 25th of September, discharged cured.

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A girl of twenty years, who had not yet menstruated, complained of stitches in the small of the back and in the region of the kidneys. On the 15th of October : Fully developed ascites, the water having risen to the fourth rib; the respiration was very much interfered with, lower extremities and face much swollen, the arms likewise began to swell. Color of the face and skin pale, but not sallow, no organic disease of the heart; very litttle, appetite, tongue clean, bowels constipated, renal region painful even when not pressed upon.

Urine straw-colored, turbid, sour, containing a considerable quantity of" albumen. Took one drachm of cochineal every day, rubbed up with an ounce of sugar of milk. Up to the eleventh day all dropsical symptoms had disappeared, the stitches in the kidneys had likewise ceased, the appetite was good, the bowels were regular, and in three weeks the urinary secretions had become normal. The remedy having been discontinued for one week, paroxysms of hemi- crania set in, and the urine again became more profuse.

Cochineal was resumed; in four days the patient was well. The amenorrhcea yielded very shortly to the acetate of iron.

DYSURIA —

In a case of dysuria, where a man of thirty years had been unable, for two years past, to emit urine except a few drops at a time, the patient was restored at once after drinking a few cups of a watery infusion of these flowers. They are generally con- sidered an excellent remedy for dysuria occasioned by excesses in sexual intercourse.

GASTRODYNIA. — The following case is described by Bernhardi as gastrodynia, where the functions of the kidneys seem likewise to have been involved.

A girl, six years old, very much emaciated, had been complaining for six months past of daily paroxysms of pain which were particularly violent between three and four o'clock in the afternoon ; the pains were seated in the precordial region which was soft and painless, but distended to the size of the abdomen ; her appetite was very slight, the tongue had a thin yellow coating on it, the fauces looked red, face sallow ; bowels regular. When first seen by the physician, she had likewise a pain between the shoulder-blades and in the hip; the urine was frequently discharged in- voluntarily. Cochineal, half a drachm, mixed in four ounces of distilled water, a tablespoonful every two hours, restored her completely and permanently in four days.

ASTHMA—

A nursing woman, twenty-nine years old, complained on the 2d of September, of chilliness with flashes of heat, frontal headache, periodical paroxysms of asthma, and occasional stitches in the right and left side. For several years past she had attacks of pains in the small of the back, tearing in the abdomen, hsemorrhoidal tumors and bleeding from the anus. Tongue clean, taste and appetite normal, fauces red, stool brown, urine having a sour reaction, turbid, fiocculent, pulse small, ninety.

Took cochineal, two drachms, to eight ounces of distilled water, a table-spoonful every two hours. After every spoonful the symptoms were much improved ; on the 4th of Sep- tember she only complained of a little backache, and on the 6th she was restored and remained so.

RHEUMATISM. — The following case of renal disease is described as rheumatism, evidently a rheumatic congestion of the left kidney.

A robust woman having gone through a severe labor, complained, about three weeks after her confinement, of pain and a feeling of weakness in the left lower ex- tremity. There was no perceptible change, nor were the parts sore when pressed upon; but pressure upon the left renal region caused an intense pain. The thick and turbid urine was scanty, with a burning sensation, and had an acid reaction. Took cochineal, one drachm rubbed up with an ounce of loaf-sugar, a teaspoonful four times a day.

An improvement commenced in twenty-fovrr hours, and in three days the patient was well and remained so.

BRIGHT'S DISEASE Even in incurable cases of Bright's dis-

748 COCCUS CACTI.

ease we have found cochineal the only remedy that would palliate the suffocative distress of breathing and the cough arising from the crowding of the water against the diaphragm. In a case of B right's disease which became complicated with hydrothorax for about six weeks before the child's death, cochineal given in the form of pills, four grains three or four times a day, palliated the distress and com- pletely removed the cough, until the patient died in consequence of the sudden supervention of hydropericardia.

MENORRHAGIA—

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in a number of cases of spasms he has found this treatment success- ful, when other remedies had been given in vain.

COOA.

[erythroxylon coca.]

This remedy, so recently brought to the attention of the medical world, is a native of Peru, and has, for centuries past, been in high estimation among the inhabitants of that country for its many real and fancied virtues. It grows wild in abundance ; but it is also carefully cultivated in the valleys of the eastern slopes of the Andes, where the plant is raised from the seed. " Like the coffee-tree, coca has a lustrous green foliage with white blossoms, which ripen into small red, or rather, scarlet berries.

When the shrub has attained an age of eighteen or twenty months, the foliage is stripped for the first time, the leaves now presenting an appearance not unlike those of the tea plant, being oval, pointed, and two or two and a half inches in length, with half that breadth at the widest part, and fur- nished with short, delicate foot-stalks ; unlike those of the tea-shrub, they are not dentate, and may be readily distinguished by a curved line running from base to apex upon either side of the mid -rib.

The foliage is known to be ripe for plucking when the leaves become sufficiently brittle to break upon bending. After stripping, the leaves are spread out to dry upon woolen blankets in the sun, great

750 COCA.

Taken in small doses coca creates a mild arterial excitement ; in- creases the peristaltic action of the intestines, promoting digestion ; relieves nervous excitement and alleviates spasms. In large doses it causes profuse secretion of urine of foul odor, watery diarrhoea of very offensive stools, derangements of the appetite, characterized by absence of hunger, with a tendency to eat heartily if food is once tasted.

*

" Want of breath and air" is a symptom which we frequently meet in persons laboring under functional heart difficulties, as a consequence of excessive use of tobacco, and in nervous derangements, especially if they depend upon onanism. Hale claims to have used the drug with good results in the former affections ; and in the treatment of derangements of the nervous system from self-abuse or sexual ex- cesses, we have derived great benefit, in a number of cases, from the administration of the remedy. I have found a remarkable aversion

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to exertion of any kind in consequence of nervous exhaustion fre- quently relieved with great promptness by coca. *

November 27, 1871. — Mrs. has had, for several weeks, a cough, worse from

752 C0FFEA.

* COFFEA.

[ARABIAN COFFEE. NATURAL ORDER, RUBIACEiE.]

For medicinal use we generally select the mocha bean. After having dried the beans by a moderate heat, we pulverize them and make a tincture with dilate alcohol, of a yellowish-brown color, which has the peculiar odor of crude coffee.

Stapf's Additions to the Materia Medica contain a tolerably accurate proving of crude coffee, which is eminently suggestive of several pathological conditions to which this substance is homoeopathic.

The known effects of coffee have generally been elicited from the burnt coffee. Although a pleasant and comparatively harmless bev- erage, yet the abuse thereof may develop poisonous symptoms of a very peculiar nature.

In Frank's Magazine several cases of poisoning with coffee are reported, one of which is the case of a servant girl, twenty-seven years old, of good constitution, not plethoric, rather thin, and whose main employment consisted in sewing. During the course of an afternoon she emptied thirty-two cups of coffee, containing the essence of four ounces of the beans. After swallowing the larger portion of the coffee, she felt indisposed, threw up some of the liquid, drank a little brandy to settle her stomach, and then finished the remainder of the coffee.

Now she began to feel the effects of this beverage; she was attacked with intolerable heat, rush of blood to the head and perspiration all over her body. She became so dizzy that she had to be carried to bed. In the evening she had a violent fever, felt hot, complained of violent headache, spasmodic contraction in the throat, rattling breathing, inability to articulate. The distress was somewhat moderated by a few spoonfuls of vinegar and cold water, but she spent a sleepless and restless night.

On the fifth day after the poisoning, the belly was still hard and distended, especially in the region of the bladder, which was painful when touched. She felt a pain in the left superior region of the abdomen near the spleen. The appetite was gone, the stomach was irritated, pressure upon the stomach caused pain, and food excited nausea ; she was weak and had no inclination to work, but was with- out fever. The ischuria still continued, the patient was only able to pass a drop of urine at a time, she had to make several attempts before succeeding, and experienced a burning and pressing pain in

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the region of the bladder during urination ; the urine caused a burn- ing in the urethra and vulva. In the course of a week the patient recovered her health.

The symptoms bear testimony to the great influence which coffee has over the nervous system and the circulation. This influence is further shown by the following statement, likewise reported by Frank : A man, sixty-six years old, had been in the habit of drinking large quantities of coffee; he finally increased his allowance to thirty cups a day. In consequence of this abuse the man was attacked with arthritic pains, depression of spirits, debility, the whole culminating in complete delirium tremens which was hushed by five-drop doses of opium every two hours.

HEMICRANIA, coffee may be of eminent use to us. Among the effects of coffea cruda upon the brain we notice the following symp- tomatic indications: Henri crania as if a nail had been driven into the parietal bone ; headache as if the brain were torn or would fly to pieces ; these symptoms are accompanied by heat about the head, flushed face, sensitiveness to noise and light, flow of water off the stomach, irritability of the stomach. Coffea cruda, or tosta, 12 to 30, will be found more appropriate than more massive doses.

The cries and restlessness of little children, when they are roused from their sleep and would like to sleep again, but are unable to do so, often yield to a few doses of coffea without any difficulty.

CHYLO-POIETIC GROUP.

This group embraces several conditions which exhibit the thera- peutic powers of coffee in a very marked manner.

VOL. I. — 47.

754 COFFEA.

VOMITING, induced hf over-eating, or arising from extreme irritability of the stomach ; even the vomiting of pregnant women may be arrested by coffee in some cases.

DYSPEPSIA, characterized by extreme irritability of the stomach, painfulness of the epigastric region to pressure, nausea after eating, or retching and vomiting of phlegm, may be materially relieved by coffea.

INDIGESTION. — An acute indigestion may be cured by swallow- ing a cup of strong black coffee ; this will restore the irritability of the organ, and enable it to throw off the contents.

BILIOUS COLIC. — Coffee may be useful in some cases of bilious colic, for it depresses the functional powers of the liver; it may cause a hard-aching pinching pain in the bowels, followed by the discharge of hard, lumpy, dark-colored stools, or with a catarrhal feeling in the bowels as if they would be moved, resulting in the emission of flatu- lence which affords relief from the hard colicky pain. An attack of this kind may be palliated or entirely cured by dessert-spoonful doses of black coffee.

BILIOUS DIAKRHCEA. — Coffee causes, and may therefore cure bilious diarrhoea, with watery discharges, causing a smarting feeling at the anus, or a feeling of roughness.

URINARY GROUP.

In the case of the seamstress, coffee caused an almost entire reten- tion of urine, with continual and painful urging. Hence we may find coffee indicated in

ISCHURIA, with inability to pass more than a few drops of urine at a time; the passage of the urine is attended with burning in the urethra and region of the neck of the bladder.

The ordinary effect of a large portion of strong coffee is an in- creased secretion of a watery urine ; it may happen, however, that, in persons endowed with a peculiar sensitiveness to inflammatory irritations of the bladder, large quantities of coffee, which is un- doubtedly capable of exciting the circulation and setting up local congestions in some peculiarly sensitive organ, may develop an in- flammatory irritation of the bladder eminently characteristic of all the pathognomonic signs of ischuria.

SEXUAL GROUP.

Coffee, if taken in large quantities, rouses the sexual instinct and gives rise to nocturnal emissions. The secondary effect is to weaken

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IMPOTENCE, with sexual excitement, dwelling of the fancy upon sexual intercourse ; more particularly, if the weakness is the result of previous abuses, coffee may prove an excellent remedy.

NYMPHOMANIA of the lighter sort, according to Ruckert, with voluptuous itching, profuse secretion of mucus and frequent dis- charges of blood.

EXCESSIVE MENSTRUATION.— Coffee may have a tendency to check excessive menstruation, or it may palliate the pains and cramps in

DYSMENORRHEA, with scanty discharge of the menstrual blood.

LABOR-PAINS or after-pains of an exhausting, spasmodic nature may be mitigated by a few doses of coffee.

RESPIRATORY GROUP.

Coffee has excited paroxysms of a short cough in quick succession ; also a dry and hacking cough, coming on suddenly, as if occasioned by a spasmodic constriction of the larynx, which seemed to be lined with dry mucus.

It has been used for years past as a remedy for cough of a nervous character, with extreme irritability of the pulmonary tissue, a continual inclination to cough, with exhaustion after the coughing fit.

WHOOPING-COUGH. — Hufeland recommends a decoction of raw coffee, with sugar and milk, in every stage of whooping-cough, especially if a high degree of atony, an increase of irritability, gen- eral nervous debility, have become prominent indications, and there is danger of apprehending a continuance of these symptoms, owing to the spasmodic tendency excited in the organs, even after the char- acteristic cough, the real whooping-cough, has been subdued.

CHRONIC COUGH Frank reports the following cure of a

chronic cough, which illustrates the therapeutic virtues of coffee in this direction in a very striking manner.

A boy of thirteen years had been attacked for several years past, about Christmas, \\ ith a sort of whooping cough, which lasted four or five weeks, day and night, and was always accompanied with fever and expectoration. Several physicians looked upon this cough as a phthisicky cough ; the patient was exceedingly emaciated and was laid up with a slow hectic fever. A concentrated decoction of raw coffee was now offered ; one ounce of the coffee was boiled with two pints and a half of water, until the quantity was reduced to one pint. Of this decoction a few tablespoonful>

756 COFFEA.

FEVER GROUP.

FEVER AND AGUE, a quantity of strong black coffee between the paroxysms has often prevented the return of a chill.