A Negligible But Highly 'Valuable' Guiding Symptom To Cure
NATIONAL JOURNAL OF HOMOEOPATHY 1999 May / Jun VOL VIII NO 3.
Dr V Narasimhan

Kent Says: Any symptom which is far removed from the pathology of the symptom, however seemingly negligible, helps in finding the similimum. In my practice, I have verified this a number of times: an objective symptom helped solve the case.

I present some such cases:
Case 1:
Mr M 59, known diabetic NIDDM for 35yrs, was on allopathic treatment with rigid diet control, in spite of which he was emaciated with extreme prostration. He had all the symptoms of a diabetic patient.

Clinical Features

1. Dim Vision: Some months back he watched a match on TV round the clock. Then the match was lost, and he was very upset and had great anxiety. When the patient said 'dim vision' I thought retinopathy- ie the 'syphilitic' stage of progression of Diabetes in spite of so called intensive treatment; though even at this stage Homoeopathy can reverse the condition of the patient to normal.
2. Night watching. Now the etiology was available. Night watching with Anxiety is the predominant symptom of 'Cocculus'. To further substantiate Cocculus, there was the non-cordination of Neuro muscular system. He could not perform voluntary movements at will. This applied also to the lack of power of accommodation of the lens of the eye, regulated by the ciliary muscles.
3. Sluggish 'rhodopsin synthesis' in retina etc confirmed. Cocculus 1M was given, giving priority to the eliminating rubric 'dim vision' and its aetiology.
4. An observation: all through history taking, whenever the patient talked, he had frothy saliva at the corners of the mouth.

Taking this last sign and repertorizing, two remedies emerged -Plumb-met and Lac-def.
Plumbum-met has frothy saliva during sleep
Lac-def - frothy saliva during conversation.

Carsickness is in both, Lac-def and Cocculus. When Allen's Keynotes were consulted, the very first line of Lac-def is, for the successful treatment of diabetes. Though illness is chronic by number of years - there are several acute symptoms, which warrant "Similars" esp in the syphilitic stage. Accordingly Lac-def 6X was prescribed. Reasons for low potency

1. to facilitate repetition and
2. for short action. Lac-def was administered after several doses of placebo following Cocculus.

In 3 months the patient was much relieved.

Further details of the case
The patient was a railway employee. He got married at the age of 16 to his niece of 29 years. From the history it is understood that his wife was Dulcamara in mental plane. He was very affectionate to her, and through her he got 2 daughters and 2 sons. After some years, he was officially deputed to Malaysia where he stayed for nearly 10 years. From there, he regularly sent money to his wife, amounting to Rs 2.25 lakhs.

But the pity was that when he returned to India, he found that his wife had changed. She went to the extent of manhandling her husband with the help of her sons-in-law, demanding huge money and denying receipt of the Rs 2.25 lakhs which he remitted from abroad. He lost the affection of his wife (disappointed love. He was cheated by his own people. He used to be homesick, when abroad.

On Analysis
Loss of his property (money)
Homesick and camp life
Disappointed love from his wife

Do these indicate Acid-phos?

These are all pathetic, thickly painted symptoms. But to establish whether a seemingly negligible symptom is valuable in selecting the remedy, 'frothy saliva' on the corners of the mouth was taken into consideration as an 'eliminating rubric' and Lac-def was preferred over Plumbum-metalicum on the basis of the frothy saliva - esp during conversation. Patient improved in several aspects. He can live with diabetes without any fear.

The tendency with diabetic patients is to habitually monitor the blood sugar level and worry about the numbers, whereas the administration of an appropriate Homoeopathic remedy makes a diabetic patient live comfortably with any sugar level in the blood.

Tips: Some Specific Keynotes
Though lowering of blood sugar level was not instantaneous, the following ill effects of diabetes are removed.

1. Loose teeth became strong (Merc-cor)
2. Burning of sole > open air (Sulph)
3. Dorsum of foot numb (Secale)
4. Restricted Lt side shoulder movement - (Spig)
5. Prostration evening by 4 p.m.
6. Weakness of calf muscle with inability to walk
7. No inclination to do any work (Abies-can)
8. Dim vision, night watching (Cocc-I)

Case 2: Hypertensive Driver qualifies for job abroad
A chronic hypertensive from 15 years found his BP normal with the help of Arundo! Earlier he had taken allopathic tranquilizers and also Homoeopathic conventional remedies like Rowalfia, Bar-mur, Cholestrinum, Aurum etc for about 3 years with no relief.

Now an analysis was made after detailed case taking and for 5 hrs he was closely observed. Patient's co-operation was excellent as he had confidence in Homoeopathy. As he was here for hardly 3 weeks, he wanted to bring down BP to normal level.

Seemingly Negligible Symptom

·         He frequently stopped talking (not stammering) and flexed his tongue upward. After watching several times I asked him why he was doing like that? He said to overcome the sensation of fornication in the palate with itching.

·         This was the valuable symptom but in no way related to hypertension or hypercholestrimia, and this led to Arundo as the remedy. It was given in 6x TDS for 3 days at a stretch. 7 days gap, placebo and again for 3 days, with close monitoring of the patient's BP. It was normal persistently from the 5th dose. He became medically fit for his job.