FERRUM PHOSPHORICUM IN ACUTE RESPIRATORY INFECTIONS


In acts on the circulation similar to Hamamelis. It is an excellent remedy in that state of inflammation described as dilatation of the blood vessels and if given then prevents the spread of the disease. In engorgement of the lungs it prevents the subsequent pneumonia. The chest feels sore, the pulse is full and soft, the expectoration is scanty and blood-streaked.


In presenting this paper on Ferrum phosphoricum in Acute Respiratory Infections, I wish to give mostly my own experience with it.

The textbooks do not say much about Ferrum phosphoricum. Farringtons Materia Medica says:.

In acts on the circulation similar to Hamamelis. It is an excellent remedy in that state of inflammation described as dilatation of the blood vessels and if given then prevents the spread of the disease. In engorgement of the lungs it prevents the subsequent pneumonia. The chest feels sore, the pulse is full and soft, the expectoration is scanty and blood-streaked.

H.S.Weaver in a recent article on laryngeal infections said:.

Ferrum phosphoricum 2x for adults and 3x or 6x for children is one of the best remedies to use at the onset of all laryngeal congestions. It is particularly well indicated when cough is one of the first symptoms. when prescribed early a and often it usually limits the spread of the inflammation and the case recovers without further medication.

I have used Ferrum phosphoricum a great deal for several years in acute respiratory infections in both adults and children. I believe that if it is given these cases early and often (unless some other remedy is bitter indicated) a good many cases of pneumonia will be prevented or aborted.

In acute coryza in adults I have not had much success with Ferrum phosphoricum unless accompanied by cough. If the patient has soreness or tightness of he chest with more or less dry cough if given Ferrum phosphoricum early it will quickly clear up without any further extension. In adults it works below the larynx and infants or children above or below.

I give it early in pneumonia with the above pulse, fever, and cough. The sputum, if any, may or may not be bloodstreaked. I like to give it before the appearance of any blood in the sputum as it seems to prevent the extension of the pneumonia and you get a mild case of short duration instead of a very extensive involvement and very sick patient with a much longer illness.

In acute coryza of infants and children, I have had good results whether cough was present or not. It soon clears up the infection and prevents and extension downward. A good many of my patients keep the “cold tablets” as they call them in the house all the time and give them as soon as one of the children gets a cold. Some come and ask for them and say they cannot get anything that clears up their colds as quickly.

As to dosage, for adults, I use 2x and for children 3x, one tablet every hour for twenty-four hours, then every two hours until improved.

A woman about 65 years of age had been sick several days when I first saw her, had a very extensive pneumonia in both lungs, was cyanosed, had rapid soft pulse, high fever, was very weak, and had a blood-streaked sputum. She was given Ferrum phosphoricum and made a very rapid recovery much to my surprise and also her friends. About three years late she again developed pneumonia and Ferrum phosphoricum cured her again.

April 13, 1934, a child 10 years old, temperature 104, pulse 130 respiration 24; complaining of plain in left chest, face was flushed, full pulse. R Bell.

April 14, 1934. Temperature 104,. respiration 26, cough and pain in chest. R Ferrum phos.

April 15, 1934. Temperature 104, respiration 32, cough, area of consolidation present in lower left lobe, some sputum.

April 16, 1934. Temperature 102, respiration 24.

April 17, 1934. Temperature 98, respiration 24, cough better,.

April 18, 1934. Temperature 98, respiration 24, chest is clear and child well.

April 20, 1934. Temperature 98, respiration 24, chest is clear and child well.

A child 7 months of age Friday: high fever, cough, short rapid respiration; R Ferrum phos. Saturday: area of consolidation in lower left lobe. Sunday: much better and lung clearing. Tuesday: Lung clear.

During the last month, I have treated three adults with pneumonia; all had been sick several days when first seen. Two cleared up quickly and one is convalescing more slowly but he worked one day, at least, with the pneumonia and was a very sick man and is lucky to be alive.

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As some homoeopaths say, “I wouldnt want to have to practice homoeopathy without a certain remedy.” I wouldnt want to have to practice homoeopathy without Ferrum phos. and I wouldnt want to have to practice medicine without homoeopathy.

HAMILTON, ONT., CANADA.

DISCUSSION.

DR. HEIMBACH: It has been experience of a good many years, almost since I have been in the practice of medicine for a good many of my families to keep Ferrum phos. 3x for their children when they get croupy, or get laryngitis. You should tell them in acute conditions to give one or two tablets every fifteen minutes or half hour until they feel better, and let them sleep-I mean the doctors-and I usually sleep through the night.

DR. BENTHACK: I am glad that this has been brought out. You cant praise it highly enough. The tissue remedies are good adjuncts to Homoeopathy especially when we have a proving from Hahnemann, Burnett says Schuessler would never have come on the idea if he hadnt read it before.

I have used Ferrum phos. When I began to study I had four children. I wrote instructions for my wife-a couple of sheets of paper in a common language that she understood, how to use Ferrum phos. I was four winters away and she took good care of the children that she never needed to call a doctor.

As to the potency, for a long time I used the third potency. Once in a while things wouldnt do quite as well. If you read Dewey and Boerickes work on the tissue remedies, you will see that is by right a real homoeopathic work. They will recommend the sixth; and when you have head complications, ear complications, ear complications, you can give, as I know, even twelve.

DR. DIXON: I have noticed when Ferrum phos. is talked about, we talk about the second, and third, and six and twelve. Why? I should like to know what some of the wheelhorses used, what potency they used, and if they never went higher.

Dr. Boger, what do you use?.

DR. BOGER: DMM. potency.

DR. ROBERTS: Two hundredth in acute cases.

DR. STEVENS: I use the 200 and a thousand.

DR. DIXON: Well, why? Why? That is what I want to know. It took me years to get away from using those low potencies in Gelsemium and Ferrum phos. It took a lot of courage and years to get away from it, and we are all bothered, each fellow here is bothered with the same complex. That is the reason I got on my feet.

DR. FARRINGTON: I think that almost any potency of Ferrum phos. will do good work, third, sixth, twelfth, all the way up to the millions. it is a powerful remedy and why shouldnt it be, composed of two of out best polychrests, iron and Phosphorus? It is a wonderful remedy in respiratory diseases, as the essayist has indicated, and why shouldnt it be, with Phosphorus as part of its composition?.

I was thinking before the doctor spoke, about that matter of the potency. I believe that Ferrum phos. is the most abused remedy in acute diseases and the most neglected remedy in chronic diseases that we have. One reason is because of Aconite, and the other because of lack of knowledge. It is not being used in high potencies for the chronic cases. It acts quickly and seldom aggravates.

What would you do if you were called to see a little three years old, at night, and found the temperature 106, and the face flushed all over to the roots of the hair, and made a very careful examination, everything but laboratory specimens and tests, and found nothing wrong with that child?.

The old school man would simply be up a stump. The mother took me into the room and turned on a light-it happened to be a standing lamp right over the bed. The child was sound asleep and the rose up and looked a round and saw me, looked at me in a wondering way, as if saying within her little mind, “I wonder who that funny old main is, standing there now.”.

One dose of a thousandth of Ferrum phos. brought the temperature from midnight to eight oclock in the morning down to 100, and it slid the rest of the way; and I dont know what was the matter with that child.

DR. BENTHACK: I have made a special study of any work I could get on Ferrum phos. and on the tissue remedies, and the best that I ever had in the English or German languages was Dewey and Boericke; they will tell you that they had the child and that they gave it a higher potency, and the fever didnt run down and they gave a high potency and the fever didnt go down; but they gave the sixth and it went down.

They will tell you a few places where they went up to two hundred, but in general it is sixth. In complications, particularly ear complications, they say dont give it below the twelfth.

Dr. Stouffer, the outstanding homoeopath in Germany, absolutely agrees with that. We have a free choice to select what is wanted.

DR. BOGER: Dr. Dixon wants to know why you the high potency. The answer to that is easy; because we get better results.

DR. BENTHACK: Sometimes; not always.

DR. BOGER: Nearly always, I use Ferrum phos. In the DMM. potency, but you can repeat Ferrum phos. oftener than you can any other potency and that is a big advantage in affections of the ear, mastoiditis and earache, especially mastoiditis. Ferrum phos. leads everything in those things, and it is away ahead of the Capsicum, a mile ahead of it. More cases of mastoiditis call for Ferrum phos. than any other remedy-and earache. Ferrum phos. is equal to Chamomilla in earache of children.

H J Porter