Phosphoricum Acidum

DEBILITY

Phosphoric acid is particularly adapted to states of debility caused by sexual excesses.

We are told by Bertrand and Pelletier, that a man who had exhausted his strength by sexual de- bauch until he was threatened with complete marasmus, speedily recovered his vigor by the use of a lemonade prepared with honey and phosphoric acid.

HYSTERIC AFFECTIONS

Sundelin recommends this acid for hysteric affections of young women with irritable fibre.

It is particularly indicated, if an excess of sensibility and irritability is accompanied by extreme delicacy and sponginess of the organic tissue, and if this condition is moreover characterized by vascular orgasm or atonic debility.

These indications are sufficiently marked to deserve our attention.

Phosphoric acid causes an abnormal sensibility of the organic fibre, with tendency to vascular erethism.

We will range in the category of nervous diseases two most important disorders, namely : Purpura haemorrhagica, and St.

Vitus' dance.

The following case of purpura occurred in our own practice.

A boy, aged fourteen years, of a feeble and rather phthisicky constitution, while skating, slipped and fell backward on the ice, jarring his spine very badly.

After picking himself up, he felt too weak to continue his amusement and walked, home.

Shortly after his arrival home he felt sick at the stomach and vomited a quantity of blood and water, filling an ordinary wash basin full.

Blood and water likewise rushed from his nostrils;

blood oozed from the pores of the skin on his abdomen and back.

These sanguineous exudations speedily ulcerated.

We intended to give the patient phosphoric acid; but this article had to be sent for in a distant city.

In the meanwhile the boy took arnica, arsenicum and secale cornutum without the least benefit.

When the phos- phoric acid arrived, the patient was pale and cold as marble ; unconscious ; the pulse had entirely disappeared; tetanic convulsions had supervened.

We mixed ten drops of the medicinal phosphoric acid in a goblet full of water, and gave the boy a desert- spoonful of the solution every five minutes.

This was late in the evening.

We left the patient at midnight, with directions to have the medicine continued all night, but to prolong the intervals should improvement show itself.

Early in the morning we visited the patient again and expected to find him dead.

The mother, who saw us coming, greeted us at the door with the announcement that the boy was better and fast asleep.

The convulsions and the vomiting had soon ceased and the child had been able to take a few spoonfuls of beef tea.

The acid was continued alone in quantities of twenty to twenty-five drops in a goblet of water in the course of a day.

In a fortnight the boy was able to resume his studies at school.

The following interesting case of chorea likewise occurred in our own practice: The patient was a girl aged ten years.

For some time past the child had allowed cups and plates to drop out of her hands, apparently from inadvertance.

The parents soon discovered that the child could not help this and that her movements assumed a somewhat spasmodic character.

The parents, seeking my advice, informed me, in reply to my various questions, that the urine, on standing over night, deposited a thick, whitish sediment, which proved to be albumen.

Phosphoric acid was selected as the remedy, and the child received five drops of the acid in a small goblet of water, which she took in the course of a day.

Increasing the dose every succeeding day, she gradually took twenty drops daily until the end of the treatment.

She was per- fectly restored in three weeks.

Veiy soon after she began the use of the acid, the albumen began to diminish and the spasms, which had become so violent, that the child had to be strapped to her bed, likewise moderated, until they ceased entirely.

A case like this might be regarded as a peculiar form of albuminuria.

It is doubtful whether phosphoric acid would be of any use in a case of chorea, where this albumin- ous deposit in the urine does not occur.

This acid is recommended as a remedy for phosphatic deposits in the urine.

It dissolves these deposits in the kidneys and bladder, but whether it will cure the phosphatic diathesis, is not quite so cer- tain.

It has been used with good effect in the strangury of old people.

Aegidi has used it with advantage in

DIABETES MELLITUS.

It is probable that the remedy acts curatively when the disease depends upon a serious derangement of the nervous system or of the nerve centers.

It is also given in

ALBUMINURIA with disinclination to talk or to answer ques- tions.

Indifference.

Hot tension of the skin of the face, as if the white of an egg had dried on it.

Urine like milk, with bloody, jelly-like lumps.

Profuse emission of urine.

Loss of fluids does not weaken the patient as much as one would suppose (Dr.

Walker).

MILKY URINE

Dr.

Hering recommends its use in the so-

ENURESIS with cutting, burning pain in the urethra and cramp-like pains in the region of the bladder.

Profuse discharge of watery urine, which immediately forms a white cloud.

Burning in the urethra while urinating.

IMPOTENCE

Phosphoric acid is an important remedy in affections of the sexual sphere.

Sundelin informs us that " many experienced practitioners, especially Berends, recommend this acid for impotence, especially when the sensibility of the parts is excessive, and the semen is discharged shortly after an erection or even before the erection is completed."

Kopp relates in his Memorabilia that he cured a case of impotence brought on by sexual excesses, by giving three times a day twelve drops of the diluted acid.

The night-sweats with which the patient had been troubled, soon disappeared, and the patient's virility was entirely restored.

The attenuated acid had entirely failed in this case.

A case of metrorrhagia is reported by Frank, in a small and delicate woman after confinement, after other remedies had failed to relieve.

The flooding had been going on for a week, in consequence of which the patient had become reduced to a very low condition.

The cure was promptly achieved with a few doses of the second attenuation.

PNEUMONIA

Dr.

Hartmann recommends phosphoric acid in pneumonia of a slow and torpid character, especially when weakness with profuse sweats is predominant, or when diarrhoea, insensibility, strong, irregular and often-intermitting pulse, with swelling of the veins are present.

It is useful in

GASTRIC CONDITIONS

This agent is not adapted to gastric fever, but may b^ serviceable, according to Trmks, in gastric condi- tions, where the following symptoms prevail : white coating on the tongue ; foul odor from the mouth, putrid taste, inclination to diarrhoea, prostration, restless and unrefreshmg sleep, exhausting morning sweats, thick urine which deposits a good deal of mucus.

In

Phosphoric acid causes formication of the whole body ; rash over the whole body, more burning than itching ; itching pustules on the nates and toes ; red blotches on the face, on the arms and legs, shoulders, abdomen, hips and knees, such as may occur at the age of pubescence.

It also causes burning and efflorescence of the skin, somewhat resembling scarlet-spots.

The symptoms may suggest the use of this acid in the

VARIOLA it is often an excellent remedy.

Lilienthal gives these indications : Confluent variola, with typhoid condition ; the pustules do not fill with jyas, but degenerate into large blisters, which, burst- ing, leave an excoriated surface.

The patient is stupid, does not want anything, not even a drink ; answers questions, but does not talk otherwise ; watery diarrhoea.

AFFECTIONS OF THE SKIN

In many affections of the skin the remedy has proved efficient.

It has been prescribed for boils, chillblains, condylomata, herpes, intertrigo, pemphigus, warts, scrofulosis, etc.

According to Lilienthal, who has already been mentioned as good authority on this specialty, we have the following subjective symptoms : Anaesthesia.

Burning after scratching.

Burn- ing pricking here and there.

Burning-stinging.

Crawling-tingling under the skin.

Itching.

Itching pressure.

Smarting pain in wounds, even of the bones.

Skin feels sore all over.

Aggravations

During repose.

From suppressed eruptions.

From loss of animal fluids.

After sweating.

Accompaniments

Diarrhoea.

Typhoid condition.

Fear of death.

Great restlessness.

In

In a case quoted by Frank, a large portion of the tibia, the upper part of the fibula, the patella, and the lower part of the femur were almost entirely destroyed.

The soft parts were correspondingly injured.

The patient was very much emaciated; every evening and noon, a paroxysm of hectic fever set in ; pulse always irritated ; night-sweats and hacking cough; the patient complained of violent seated pains in the other limb, and in other parts of his body.

He was put on the use of phosphoric acid, two drachms to half an ounce of the concentrated acid in ten ounces of water, a table-spoonful every three hours.

This solution was likewise injected into the carious parts.

He commenced to improve very soon after he began to use the acid, and was entirely restored in eight months.

Owing to exposure and bad diet, the fingers became cold, livid, cadaverous, with intense pain in the fingers, especially in bed.

They felt numb, were painful to pressure which left pits; the roots of the nails became tuberous; friction was more agreeable than external warmth.

The toes having likewise become invaded, the patient sought professional aid.

Nothing seemed of any avail except phosphoric acid ; after using it perseveringly, the mortified joints became detached, and the patient's health, which was declining, became restored.

ANTIDOTAL TREATMENT In cases of poisoning the anti- dotes are chalk, whiting or magnesia suspended in water.

In the absence of these we may resort to soap-suds, weak solutions of the alkaline carbonates, infusion of wood-ashes, white of eggs, milk, oil, or any mild diluents.

Symptoms of gastro-enteritis are afterward combated with aconite, etc.