[Read before the I.H.A., Bureau of Clinical Medicine, June 9-11, 1932.].
When I first began the practice of medicine I had had the fear of smallpox and diphtheria so effectually drilled into me that I would go blocks out of my way to avoid passing houses where there were cases. In my first 16 years of practice I lost every case of diphtheria that had the misfortune to fall into my hands,except one. Some record! This last case was the worst one of all; a case on which the very best allopathic talent had fallen down; a case of “black” diphtheria”, so they diagnosed it. I can therefore sympathize with those, especially the “erudite”, who are either so indolent, or so ignorant of Hahnemannian homoeopathy that they must resort to the impossible antitoxin on every and all occasions.
To inoculate 2,000 or more children with antitoxin, and then brag about it, as was done by a former member of this Association, in a former issue of The Recorder, sheds no lustre on the erudition of anyone, medically or otherwise. What a calming comfort it must be to any physician to administer a dose of antitoxin to a victim, only to have that victim drop dead before the doctor has had time to step off the front porch! That very thing has happened, and the death certificate prevaricatingly signed heart-failure in order to save the face of the antitoxin. How long would homoeopathy survive if it were as continually producing such devastations?.
Will someone please, explain: If germs basically cause disease, how it comes that we are not able to diagnose disease and its causes long before its end results develop and are apparent? On the other hand, why is it that we do not discover these germs until after the results of the disease have developed? Just why do those germs disappear before the disease gets entirely well? If it were true that the basic cause of disease is germs, could that disease ever be cured until every one of those germs is destroyed? How about the carrier? Why did Bechamp dub Pasteurs Germ Theory the “greatest silliness of the age”? Was it because Bechamp, the teacher, was less learned than Pasteur, the scholar?
If germs are the basic cause of diphtheria, how does it come that the potentized remedy, having no germicidal power whatever according to our allopathic brothers, cures the very worst types of diphtheria? That homoeopathy cures the very worst, the most serious and malignant types of diphtheria has had too many years of clinical and intelligent verification to be denied by the most dense and ignorant of doctors. All of which is proof positive that it is the disease that produces and fashions the germ, and not the germ that produces and fashions the disease. The indications for the remedy must be based on the basic cause of the disease, as well as the basic symptom totality of the symptoms caused directly by the drug on the normal human body, and not on the crude end products of the disease.
It is a hopeful sign that the general public is waking up to the fact of the dangers arising from the use and abuse of these serums when the manufacturers of these concoctions are having to pull off such disgraceful fakes on a confiding public, as that faked dog race to Nome, Alaska; the creation of the fictitious dog Balto, and the trumped up and imaginary number of cases of diphtheria, as well as the number of cases alleged to have been saved; and all this aided and abetted by radio broadcasting corporations. It shows to what extremity corporate greed will go to commercialize human health and life in order to make money. The Creator will not allow this to go on forever, the day of reckoning is fast approaching!.
The single case mentioned above, that I saved, had most beautiful and clear-cut indications for Arsenicum album. The response was so prompt, the cure so complete (I saw the patient a short time ago and he reminded me of it) that it completely changed my mind both as to the overexaggeration of the dangers of diphtheria and the much exaggerated statements that homoeopathy was unequal to the task of fully combating it. That case taught me how to handle the situation to such an extent that in the 31 years that I have practised in Toledo I have not lost a case of throat trouble of any kind, though I have had some choice specimens of diphtheria of my own, as well as some passed on to me.
There is but one, and only one, reason for homoeopathy to fall down in the cure of true diphtheria, either the wrong remedy, or the wrong potency. The superiority and the prompt response and efficiency of homoeopathy with the positively indicated remedy in diphtheria over all other methods will become easily apparent to any physician who desires and is willing to learn. Our failures are due to our own lack of knowledge, and not to homoeopathy, as our pride would like them to be. If I were to be denied all the remedies for diphtheria but one, I should choose.
MERCURIUS CYANATUS.
The first thing that strikes one in a Merc. cy. case is the profound prostration right from the start; so weak he cannot stand; cold; cyanotic; collapse threatens. The most characteristic membrane is greenish, though in some cases it may be white, yellow, or gray, and it spreads over a large area, even appearing at the anus. There is a marked tendency to destruction of the soft parts of the palate and fauces. Great foetor; breath offensive. Secretions profuse, especially the sweat. Salivary glands swollen; saliva thick and ropy. Fauces red. Dysphagia. Tongue in ordinary cases brown; in severe cases black. Pulse intermittent rapid, small and without volume. Epistaxis comes on, a dangerous sign. Worse night and heat of bed. Adapted to the true adynamic type.
COMMENT: This remedy must be carefully differentiated from Diphtherinum, Merc. cy. having more tendency to free perspiration, nightly aggravation, and aggravation from the heat of the bed. It is no credit to any one who professes to be a homoeopath to have an allopath use his (the homoeopaths) Merc. cy. on 81 cases of diphtheria with but a single death. It looks as if the allopath knew how to use the modern homoeopaths tools better than the modern homoeopath. Antitoxin has never been known to have produced such a record! As a preventive of diphtheria Merc. cy. ranks high, perhaps equalling, if not exceeding, Diphtherinum, when given in the 30x or cc potencies. Hering quotes from Allg. Hom. Ztg., Vol. 88, p. 92, this:.
If the remedy is given in the stage of invasion, i.e., before exudation is deposited, it will not appear at all; as a prophylactic it is equally effective; paralysis and other diseases have not been observed after use of this drug. Several physicians have never seen any results from it because they gave the 2nd and 3rd trituration or dilution, which is much too strong, or rather, not sufficiently developed.
I have had the opportunity of confirming the above, both curatively and as a preventive.
A splendid, but not fully proven, remedy that should be considered next to this is.
DIPHTHERINUM.
The first thing that strikes one in a Diphtherinum case is the malignant tendency, epistaxis, and prostration right from the start; the patient being too prostrated to complain. Painless cases. The membrane is usually thick gray, or brownish black. Collapse almost from the beginning. Restless. Apathetic. Sopor. Stupor. Besotted look (Bapt.). Foetor; discharges very offensive. Swelling of throat, tonsils and palatine arches, dark red; of parotid and cervical glands. Pulse rapid, weak. Weakness. Vital reaction low. Temperature subnormal.
COMMENT: There is every reason to believe that when this remedy is fully proven and thoroughly understood it will prove to be in the prevention of diphtheria what Variolinum has proven to be in the prevention of smallpox. When the patient seems doomed from the start and all our apparently well chosen remedies fail, let us not give up all hope until we have tried this remedy, preferably in the cc potency.
While we are on the more serious aspect of this disease, let us next review.
AILANTHUS GLANDULOSA.
The first thing that strikes us in an Ailanthus case is the capillary congestion occurring in spots, red and mottled; the rash coming out imperfectly because the body is so full of poison that the poison impedes the vital force, it is dark mixed with bluish spots, livid, purple, in patches. Membrane, not pronounced, is grayish, deep-seated; small patches; on tonsils. Malignant forms. Throat dusky red; almost purple; swollen externally and internally. Nose obstructed, discharge ichorous; foetor. Odor foetid, cadaverous, like stinking meat from nose and mouth. Discharge acrid; from mouth, making lips sore. Stupor. Indifference, with sighing. Besotted look (Bapt., Diphth.), face purple, eyes congested. Delirium. Vomiting. Becomes drowsy. Torpid. Skin livid, purple. Prostration extreme.
COMMENT: Ail. produces a more profound stupor than Bapt. Prostration at onset is a leading indication. Very useful when the disease turns suddenly and a zymotic state appears, with pain in head and back of neck.
