Alstonia scholaris
by E. A. Farrington — A Clinical Materia Medica
Alstonia, so far as proved, causes debility, low fever, often with diarrhoea, and, when pushed, rigors, sweat, etc., purging, cramps and vertigo. Clinically, it has been used in chills and fever, and in diarrhoea of malarial origin, here vieing with China.
It contains Ditaine, which, like Curare, paralyzes peripheral motor nerve filaments. This is not, as in Chininum, preceded by reflex excitement. Ditaine evidently paralyzes vaso-motor nerves. It seems to resemble China in diarrhoea, chills, etc., but has not the irritability of the latter.