Oenothera biennis

Volume I — Special Symptomatology

(Tree Primrose.)

Botanical Description. — This is an indigenous, biennial plant, with an erect, rough stem, branching, from two to five feet high. The leaves are ovate-lanceolate, alternate, acute, obscurely toothed, roughly pubescent, from three to six inches long and from half-an-inch to an inch wide, those on the stem sessile, and the radicals tapering into a petiole. The flowers are numerous, pale-yellow, sessile, odorous, and are disposed in a terminal, somewhat leafy spike; they are nocturnal, open but once by night, and

continue only a single day. Each flower opens about dusk, and does not close until about nine or ten o'clock the next morning.

Pursh remarks that he has frequently observed a singularity in this plant, and it might be interesting to make further inquiry into its cause. It is that, in a dark night, when no objects can be distinguished at an inconsiderable distance, this plant, when in full flower, can be seen at a great distance, having a bright white appearance, which, probably, may arise from some phosphoric properties of the flower. The bark, leaves, and twigs are the parts used; their taste is very viscid, with a subsequent slight acrimony, which last is diminished by desication. Water takes up the properties of the plant.

Officinal Preparations— Tincture of the whole plant; dilutions.

Analogues. — (? )

(No provinge.)

0 Summer diarrhoea of children. — " Its use was attended in all cases by surprising results. In many cases where the evacuations had been for days from one to two hours apart, they became six and eight hours, after the first dose, and in some instances a single dose effected a cure. There were few instances of the disease continuing* more than two or three days, the evacuations steadily decreasing in frequency. Dose one drop of the Tincture after each evacuation. (Dr. J. S. Douglas.)

"Exhausting watery diarrhoea, every two hours — after typhoid fever, cured by (Enothera Tincture, after Arsenicum, Veratrum, Mercurius, Phosphoric acid, etc., had been given for five days unavailingly.

0 Chronic diarrhoea (every summer) in a thin, emaciated woman, cured in a week. {Dr. Perrine.)

0 Diarrhoea after confinement, with great despondency, paleness and emaciation. {Douglas.)

° Chronic Diarrhoea — for twelve months — about twelve evacuations daily. {Ih.) [Dr. Douglas' experience, above, was written in Feb., 1871. In June,

1872, he writes me that " up to the present time it continues to justify my

early expectations of it." — Hale.

Volume II — Special Therapeutics

Dr. J. S. Douglas, of Milwaukee, was the first to use this remedy in homoeopathic practice. He has been quite enthusiastic in its praises in cholera infantum and in other water diarrhoeas of children. The late Dr. Perrine reported some successful clinical experience in similar affections.

I cannot learn that any other practitioners of our school have had any success in treating bowel complaints with this medicine.

Dr. T. R. Nute, of Chicago, is now about the only physician who uses the QEnothera much. He regards it as a sort of panacea for “all the ills that flesh is heir to.” He read a long paper, lauding its virtues, before the Illinois State Homoeopathic Society, in June, 1874. The same paper, with some additions, was published in the “United States Medical and Surgical Journal” a few months afterwards.

I think Dr. Nute has a monomania in favor of the drug. As

it is a harmless one (i. e., both the drug and the monomania), he may be allowed to keep them both.

At present, whatever virtues are actually possessed by the (CEnothera are buried under such fulsome praise, and its position as a nostrum, that I do not think it worth while to try and rescue it. ,

Since the above was written this remedy seems to have attracted some attention in the allopathic school. I give the following testimony for what it is worth :

Oenothera B iennis in Mucous Inflammations. — (Enothera biennis, or evening primrose, which is indigenous to all parts of the United States, possesses valuable properties as a mild sedative and alterative in many diseased conditions of mucous surfaces, especially the gastric, intestinal, and vesical. It is useful in some forms of dyspepsia, particularly those accompanied by an irritable state of the stomach and of the bladder, as indicated by frequent vomiting and micturition. Having prescribed the remedy for eight years, I have been able to carefully note its effects, and am convinced it will be an important addition to our list of medicines. A brief history of a few cases will best illustrate its action.

Case I. — A man, aged twenty-six, of active habits, had dyspepsia for five years. His most distressing symptom was an almost constant pain in the region of the bladder, with frequent micturition. He had been treated in various ways without benefit, and was more than once sounded for stone. He was given half a drachm of fluid extract of oenothera with a drachm of tincture of cinchona com. in water, just before meals, with immediate and permanant relief.

Case II. — A gentleman who had been a dyspeptic for many years had suffered especially from frequent vomiting of food, distress after eating, and restlessness at night, which was aggravated by a desire to urinate. Half a drachm of the fluid extract, just before eating and at bedtime, promptly checked the vomiting, allayed the irritability of the bladder, and gave him refreshing rest at night.

Case III. — Mr. M., aged forty, while convalescing from typhoid fever, was attacked with an obstinate dysentery, with severe tenesmus and frequent discharges of bloody mucus. For five days the disease resisted every known remedy, including Anodyne enemas, Calomel and Opium, Turpentine emulsion, etc. All other treatment was then discontinued, and twenty-five drops of fluid extract of (Enothera were given every three hours. The dysenteric discharges entirely ceased after the second dose, and the patient had a natural fecal discharge within twelve hours.

Dr. N. S. Davis, of Chicago, has recently found valuable results from this remedy. He says :

From my own clinical observation I am inclined to regard it as a mild but efficient sedative to nervous sensibility, acting more especially on the pneumogastric nerve. — “ Quarterly Abstract of Medical Science,” February, 1877.

Its chief value, I believe, will be found in typhoid fever, to the treatment of

which it is peculiarly adapted by its soothing action upon the intestinal mucous surface. I am convinced that it essentially modifies the inflammatory condition which precedes ulceration of Peyer’s patches, and that its use may frequently prevent ulceration. The usual dose in typhoid fevers is from fifteen to thirty drops every three hours. There is no danger of an overdose, and I have known a tablespoonful of the fluid extract to be given every two hours, by mistake, till two ounces had been taken. In that case it seemed to revive the patient, after the manner of a stimulant, and I am not sure that it might not be advantageously given in large doses in some cases. The fluid extract of CEnothera is not incompatible in mixtures with any other medicine. Its flavor resembles that of cold tea, and it is acceptable to any condition of the stomach. It appears to be well worthy the attention of the profession, and the writer would be pleased to learn the results of its use in the hands of other practitioners. — James F. Sullivan, M.D., in “Pacific Medical Journal.”