Opium
מאת Henry N. Guernsey — Key-Notes to the Materia Medica
Historical reference for practitioners and students. The statements below reflect the named author’s homeopathic teaching and do not establish treatment effectiveness. This text is not medical advice and must not replace appropriate diagnosis or care.
Mental.--Daring state of the mind; gaiety; affections of the intellect; very easy of comprehension; delirium.
Face.--Bluish appearance of the face; very red; bloated; distorted.
Chest.--Where there is continued and steady stertorous breathing (there may be occasional stertorous breathing as for instance, coming on and lasting a little while after a convulsion--but wait and see whether that does not presently die away; if there is continued stertorous breathing, give Opium). Respiration deep; unequal.
Stool.--Obstructed evacuation; stools resemble hard, round, black balls, and are voided in succession; evacuation obstructed from indurated feces.
Sleep.--Drowsiness; sleep not refreshing; deep and heavy, with stertorous respiration; with open eyes; concomitant complaints to morbid. Dreams very pleasant; amorous; fantastic.
Fever.--Absence of perspiration; heat without perspiration; very hot, sweltering perspiration; complaints concomitant to perspiration i.e., those which may appear with perspiration. Intermittent fever where the chilliness is followed by heat, with perspiration which may be hot and sweltering; where there is no chill, but the fever is accompanied by this perspiration; patient may not feel cold all day, or may have only a little chill, and at night when in bed complain that, "the sheets feel so very hot."
Sensations.--Feeling of numbness in the outer part; of some kind of an obstruction in the inner parts; pains like labor pains.
Generalities.--Pupils dilated--may see this after cholera infantum where the brain is threatened: hardness of hearing; hunger without desire to eat. Discharge of urine too scanty. Labor pains ceasing, labor too weak. Apoplexy with stertorous breathing; blackness of outer parts; blueness of the whole skin or cyanosis. Motion convulsive; clonic spasms, especially when the stertorous breathing lasts all the time between the spells; blue-black swelling here and there over the body.
Worse.--From anxiety or fear; from reproaches; with drunkards; after brandy; from spirituous liquors in general; during respiration; on rising; during sleep; after sleep; in pregnancy where the mother complains of the violent motions of the fœtus. (Sensation as though a living fœtus were moving in the abdomen, when there is nothing there, Croc. sat.)
Remedies following:--Acon., Bellad., Bryon., Hyosc., Nux mosch., Nux vom., Tart. emet.
Antidote:--Ipec.