Homeopathic Materia Medica

Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica, James Tyler Kent

Skin: This remedy has so many symptoms on the surface of the body we will study the outer aspect first. All over the body is found a thick rash, sometimes of a rose color.

It is rough and can be felt as a rough rash under the fingers. The patient at this time is greatly distressed by heat and the skin is sensitive to touch with the rash or without it. Nodular swellings here and there come and go.

Then comes an erysipelatous inflammatory condition, in patches, here and there, about the head, with great tumefaction about the face, eyes and eye-lids.

Erysipelas may occur anywhere, but it more commonly belongs to the face and runs to a high degree of inflammatory action, with stinging, burning and oedema. In the extremities we have a marked dropsy, swelling with pitting upon pressure.

A general anasarca may appear. The face is greatly swollen at times, the eyelids look like water bags, the uvula hangs down like a water bag, the abdominal walls are of great thickness and pit upon pressure, and the mucous membranes in any part look as if they would discharge water if they were punctured.

Puffing or oedema, with pitting upon pressure, is a general condition that may be present in any inflammatory state, There is a general amelioration from cold and aggravation from heat. The skin symptoms and the patient are aggravated from heat.

This prevails also in the mental state, in inflammatory conditions; in cardiac conditions, in dropsy, in sore throat, etc. Sometimes this aggravation amounts to aggravation from warm drinks, warm room, warm clothing, warmth of the fire, etc.,; if it is heat the patient is greatly disturbed.

Brain: In brain troubles, if you put an Apis patient with congestion of the brain into a warm bath he will go into convulsions, and consequently warm bathing is not always "good for fits."

It is taught in old school text-books so much that the old women and nurses know that a hot bath is good for fits, and before you get there just as like as not you will have a dead baby.

This congestion of the brain, with little twitchings and threatening convulsions, makes them put the baby in a hot bath, and it is in an awful state when you get there. If the baby needs Opium or Apis in congestion of the brain the fits become worse by bathing in hot water.

If the nurse has been doing that kind of business you have learned the remedy as soon as you enter the house, for she will say the child has been worse ever since the warm bath, has become pale as a ghost and she was afraid he was going to die.

There you have convulsions worse from heat, pointing especially to Opium and Apis. That is the way with Apis all through. It is not laid down in the books that Apis is worse in the throat symptoms from warm drinks and wants altogether cold things, and will not take warm things which aggravate, but one of our graduates wrote me that by making use simply of the generals, as he had been instructed, Apis conforming to all the rest of the case, he made a beautiful cure of a case of diphtheria which had the relief from cold, which shows how generals are continued into particulars and how they can be made use of.

The generals continue to build and enlarge our Materia Medica. Upon the outer surface then we see that Apis is full of dropsy, red rash, eruptions, urticaria, erysipelas, which inflammations extend to the mucous membranes.

The outer part of man is his skin and mucous membrane. When we are dealing with man from centre to circumference, we think of the innermost as the brain and heart and internal organs that are vital, while their coatings and coverings are external.

Apis affects the things that are external; it affects the envelopes, the coverings. You notice how frequently it affects the skin and the tissues near the skin, and it also affects the envelopes or coverings of organs; for example, the pericardium. It establishes serous inflammations with effusion. Apis produces an inflammation of the membranes of the brain. In the serous sac which encloses the heart, pericardium, and also in the peritoneum it produces the same kind of inflammation.

Thus we see that the coverings are especially affected by Apis, viz., the skin and mucous membranes and the coverings of organs; and with these we get dropsy, catarrh and erysipelas.

In all of these inflammatory conditions there is stinging and burning; burning like coals of fire at times, and stinging as if needles or small splinters were sticking in.

Mind: The mental symptoms of Apis are very striking, and the most striking thing throughout the mental state is the aggravation from heat and from a warm room,

The symptoms themselves are great sadness, constant tearfulness without any cause, weeping night and day; cannot sleep from tantalizing thoughts and worrying about everything.

Depression of spirits with constant weeping. Sadness and melancholy; extreme irritability; borrowing trouble about everything. Foolishly suspicious and jealous. Absolutely joyless. Absolutely indifferent to everything that would make her happy or joyful.

No ability to apply things that would make her happy to herself, they must mean someone else. Foolish, silly, childish behavior in a woman in confinement, in a woman in advanced years; talking foolish twaddle, such as a child would talk, on serious, occasions.

Another aspect of the mental state is the delirium, which comes on in serious forms of brain affections in children. The child gradually goes into a state of unconsciousness.

Lies in a stupor, one side of the body twitching the other side motion less, rolling head from side to side; head drawn -back rigidly; pupils contracted or dilated, eyes very red, face flushed, a stupid state or state of semi-consciousness. Child lying with the eyes partly, closed, as if benumbed.

It is suitable in congestion of the brain, meningitis or cerebro-spinal meningitis with opisthotonos when all the symptoms are aggravated from heat.

Child: The child puts on a more dreadful state if the room becomes overheated; become extremely death-like or pale if the room becomes overheated.

If the child is able to do so it kicks the covers off. If it is in a position where it can look into a large open grate it will be much aggravated. I have seen Apis children who had to be removed from near an open fire.

They will cry, to get away from the heat that comes upon them from the register or open fire. The heat increases every symptom, and sometimes causes them to break out in a cold sweat all over the body, which does not ameliorate their fever nor the burning heat.

Very often the head is rolling and tossing, the teeth gnashing, and the eyes flashing with threatening convulsions, the child carrying the hand to the head at times, a state of semi-consciousness, and the child screams out with that peculiar scream which is known to mean congestion of the brain - cri encephalique - the brain cry.

The shriek is a very strong Apis feature. The child cries out with this shriek in sleep when going into brain troubles. It says in the text:

"Sopor interrupted by piercing shrieks."

We must be able to see in the general beginning of provings the disease which they resemble, for we do not always see the remedy in the advanced state.

We see the diseases in a state of progress, and must be able to see it in its beginning. As was the disease in the beginning so was the remedy in the beginning. Things that have similar beginnings may have similar endings.

Apis also has muttering, delirium and loquacity. All kinds of screaming and shrieking, shrill and otherwise, violent and less violent. Premonition of death, dread of death, fear of apoplexy.

"Very busy, restless, changing kind of work, with awkwardness."

Awkwardness is especially found under the fingers, toes and limbs in Apis. The whole nervous system shows a disturbance in co-ordination. This disturbance in co-ordination runs through the remedy, awkwardness, staggering with the eyes shut.

Dizziness when the eyes are shut.

"Ailments from fright, rage, vexation, jealousy or hearing bad news."

"After severe mental shock paralyzed on the whole right side."

Violence and rapidity: The complaints of Apis are attended with violence and rapidity. They come on with great rapidity, rush on with violence, until unconsciousness is reached. It has been my fortune to see many violent cases of poisoning from the sting of the honey-bee.

When the over sensitive patient is poisoned by the sting he is dreadfully sick. The majority of people in the course of their life have been stung by the honey-bee and a mere little swelling occurs in the region of the sting, a swelling as big as a robin's egg or 4 hen's egg at most, without constitutional states; that is, when the individual is not sensitive to Apis.

He may have been stung in half a dozen places, and each one gives him a little lump.

But you meet one who is sensitive to the sting of the honey-bee, and if he gets one little sting on any place in his body, he comes down with nausea and anxiety that makes him feel that he is dying, and in about ten minutes he is covered with urticaria from head to foot; he stings and burns and wants to be bathed in cold water; he fears that he will die if something is not done to mitigate his suffering, rolls and tosses as if he would tear himself to pieces.

I have seen all these symptoms come on after Apis. The antidote for that is Carbolic acid. I have seen Carbolic acid administered in that state, and the patient described the sensation of the Carbolic acid going down his throat as a cooling comfort.

He says:

"Why, doctor, I can feel that dose go to the ends of my fingers."

When you administer an antidote under such circumstances listen to what your patient says. When you get the true natural antidote, and, at times, when you get the true curative medicine in a case, no matter how high the potency is, the patient will say:

"I feel that to the roots of my hair and to the ends of my toes."

Such is the feeling it gives when the true antidotal medicine goes to the innermost portions of his economy, and that is the way we want to get our medicines always, to be guided by the symptoms of our patient that they will tell us what medicine to administer, and when the medicine is administered its highest reaction is of that sort.

Eyes: If we are well acquainted with the symptoms of Apis we can many times get along without having a specialist to treat the eyes. They make more people blind with their lotions, caustic solutions, etc., than they benefit.

The old-fashioned way was to cauterize with copper and silver nitrate solution, and the modern things are not much better. At the present day, the homoeopathic physician who is not capable of taking eye symptoms as well as lung symptoms and symptoms of any part of the body is not competent to practice medicine.

Eye cases can be prescribed for by the physician. In Homoeopathy there is no such thing as treating the eye and other organs of the body, but the patient with all his organs, not the patient with one or two organs.

Apis is a great remedy for the eyes. It has deep-seated inflammatory complaints of the eyes as a result of disease. Inflammations that are erysipelatous in character, that leave thickening of the mucous membrane and lids, and white spots over the eye; opacities.

Inflammation with opacities very extensive or in patches. Enlarged blood vessels.

Face: When the inflammatory condition is active it is attended with oedema of the lids, both upper and lower, and the whole face is sometimes in a state of oedema, such as you would expect to see after a bee sting.

The swelling of the mucous membranes of the lids is so enormous that they roll out, looking like pieces of raw beef. The fluid will run out over the cheeks in great abundance. Burning and stinging like fire, better from washing, from cold applications, worse from heat.

Chronic eye troubles that are worse from looking into an open fire, worse from radiated heat; wants something cold applied. Chronic granular lids. The results of chronic inflammation are numerous and extensive. Worse from looking at white things, worse from looking at the snow.

Pain in the eyeballs, pain deep in the eyeballs, stitches, burning, stinging and shooting. Chemosis. Apis is often suitable for old scrofulous affections of the eyes. Vascular. affections, the veins are enlarged.

"Iritis."

"Congestion to the eyes, blood-vessels injected;" whole conjunctiva inflamed.

Photophobia. Rheumatic ophthalmia, that is, a high grade of inflammation of the eyes in rheumatic subjects. Catarrhal inflammation of the eyes; scrofulous inflammation of the eyes. Hot tears gush out of the eyes; burning in the eyes.

Erysipelas of the eyes and sides of the face, extending from the right to the left. This direction is an Apis feature in many other respects.

Erysipelas commences on the right side of the face, extends over the nose to the left side.

Inflammation commences in the right side of the abdominal viscera and extends over to the left. In inflammation of the ovary the right is preferred to the left. The right side of the uterus is preferred. Pains in the whole right side of the pelvis extending over towards the left. Burning stinging here and there extending from right to left.

Inflammation of the middle ear in connection with or after scarlet fever.

Throat: Now we come to the throat troubles of Apis. We have much throat trouble.

Apis cures diphtheria, especially when there is a high grade of inflammation and the membrane is scanty or comes slowly or insidiously, and it is somewhat of a surprise the gradual progress it makes; the parts are oedematous and the soft palate is puffed like a water-bag, and the uvula hangs down with a semi-transparent appearance like a bag of water.

All around the throat and mouth there is an oedematous condition looking as if it would flow water if pricked. Burning, stinging pains in the throat ameliorated by cold and aggravated by heat. Aversion to all warm substances and drinks.

The tongue swells until it fills the mouth, worse on the right half of the tongue, or involving the right side first. Raw beef appearance, denuded appearance of the tongue and buccal cavity and throat.

Various kinds of swelling in the throat; benign swellings, with burning, stinging and redness. Ulcers in the throat that come as a result of this inflammation. Apis is suitable in the severest forms of sore throat accompanying scarlet fever.

Scarlet fever: It cures scarlet fever when the symptoms agree, and it is not an uncommon thing for Apis to be suited to scarlet fever, though the rash is sometimes rough.

The scarlet fever rash is not always smooth and shiny. When the rash does not come out at all the face is very pallid, with a high grade of inflammation of the throat; the scarlet fever is in the family, and the skin is red without any rash; in those cases that are worse from heat, want the covers off, and are sensitive to the heat of the room.

The patient desires a low temperature in the room, is worse from heat, wants cool things, worse from radiated heat especially, or hot air that comes from a register or fire.

He suffocates when a little warm air is radiating over the body. He is disturbed from heat even in the chill of an intermittent fever; if in a warm room when having a chill, he suffocates. So it is with the scarlet fever, with the sore throat, and in diphtheria; from the least whiff of radiated heat he suffocates.

He wants the doors and windows open, wants something cold. Sometimes the scarlet fever patient will go into convulsions because the rash fails to come out.

Apis is sometimes a suit able remedy and must be compared with Cuprum, Zincum and Bryonia. A warm bath will intensify the convulsion.

"Sensation of constriction and erosion in the throat in the morning."

Throat sore and swollen; stinging pains.

"Could not shallow solid food."

With these complaints there is often shivering, shuddering, little chills intermingled with the febrile state. Many times you will think to comfort him by covering him up with a warm blanket, but it will make him worse, he will throw it off.

A child will kick off the covert an adult who is shivering while covered up will kick off the covers. These strange and peculiar things are guiding features, things that cannot be accounted for.

Stomach and abdomen: In Apis there is vomiting, nausea, retching and vomiting, with great anxiety. Vomiting of bile and everything eaten. Vomiting of bitter and sour fluids

Apis causes soreness and tightness throughout the abdomen and hypochondria. Sensation of tightness runs through many of the complaints of Apis. The abdomen is distended with gas.

Meteoritic condition, great tension and fullness, hard and drum-like. In all inflammatory complaints, in peritonitis, inflammation of the liver, inflammation of the pelvis, there is great tension, tightness; but this tightness is not always general, sometimes it is local; sometimes it is with little congestion, but tightness prevails throughout the abdomen, and this tightness makes it impossible for the patient to cough for fear something will burst.

The cough makes him feel as if something would be torn. Cannot strain at stool. This is common in the abdominal and pelvic complaints of women. The woman will say she cannot strain at stool, because of the feeling that if she strains something will break loose.

The same state exists in the chest It seems that on coughing something will tear loose, as if the fibres are in a state of tension or stretching.

Hypersensitive state of the liver; inflammation of the liver and spleen. Pain under the short ribs, worse on the left side.

"Pains from below the ribs spreading upward. Obliged to bend forward from a painful contracted feeling in the hypochondria."

All the complaints are likely to make the patient bend forward and flex the limbs, because the state of tension is painful.

Sensitiveness of the stomach to touch. Over the whole abdomen she is so sore that touch is extremely painful; in all the inflammatory complaints of women the abdomen is very sore and painful. Soreness, distension and stinging burning pains through the abdomen. Burning beat in the stomach.

In the external abdomen there is an oedematous state. Dropsy, sometimes alone, sometimes with anasarca. Limbs swollen to the full extent, pitting upon pressure, the feet and limbs swollen, with burning, stinging and numbness in the limbs.

Feeling as if the intestines were bruised. Watery diarrhea is common in Apis; yellow stools, green stools, olive green stools, watery stools, etc.

Every day six to eight diarrheic stools, which smell like carrion. It is especially useful in a peculiar kind of stool occurring in children and infants, and intermingling of blood, mucus and food, giving the stool an appearance like tomato sauce.

The anus protrudes with stool and seems to remain open, an open anus like Phosph, and Puls. Chronic diarrhea dysentery, haemorrhage from the bowels.

In its constipation it is related more commonly to head troubles. He goes many days without a stool. The bowels seem to be perfectly paralyzed, with congestion of the brain and acute hydrocephalus.

Urines: The urinary troubles are numerous in Apis.

The urine is scanty, coming only in drops. Much straining before the urine will start, and then only a few drops; dribbling a little hot urine, burning urine, bloody urine. As soon as a few drops collect in the bladder the urging comes, constant, ineffectual urging.

Later the urine is almost suppressed. Infants go a long time without passing urine screeching and carrying the hand to the head, crying out in sleep, kicking off the covers. Very often a dose of Apis will be found useful.

It is often called for in scarlet fever when the urine is loaded with albumen. Urinary troubles, with swelling of the genitals, and the swelling is oedematous

Scanty urine in little boys, with the foreskin enormously distended, or in hydrocele. Every time the call to urinate comes he will shriek, because he remembers the pain he had the last time. Inflammatory complaints of the kidneys and ureters, bladder and urethra.

The whole urinary tract is irritated, very much like Cantharis, and these two medicines antidote each other. If you are called to a child that has been drugged with crude Apis you can generally antidote it with Cantharis. If you go to a woman who has taken Cantharis for vicious purposes, you can very often overcome it with Apis. The violent frenzy that has been brought on by Cantharis will be overcome by Apis.

The smarting, burning and stinging along the urinary tract will be found under Apis.

"Flow of urine, unconscious."

Stitching pain in the urethra with enuresis. Morbid irritability of the urinary organs.

"Strangury. Agony in voiding urine. Retention of urine in nursing infants."

It is queer how the old women knew, long before Apis was proved, that when the little new-born baby did not pass its water they could find a cure by going out to the bee-hive and catching a few bees, over which they poured hot water, and of which they gave the baby a teaspoonful.

Some domestic things like that have been known among families and among nurses, and it is consistent because it is just like what we give Apis for.

"Urine scanty and foetid, containing albumen and blood corpuscles."

Especially in acute albuminuria. The acute inflammatory affection of the kidney with albuminuria, such as occurs in scarlet fever or diphtheria, or after these, such as occurs as a sequel of acute disease.

Inflammation of the kidney closes up the case and kills off a good many in allopathic hands, never in homoeopathic hands. It is closely related to the genital organs of both male and female. Swelling and oedematous state of the genitals. Apis is a great friend of the woman. It cures all of her inflammatory complaints it seems, when the symptoms agree.

That is to say, it produces inflammation of the uterus and ovaries and dreadful sufferings in the external and internal parts, and we have only to discover when the symptoms agree to cure most of these inflammatory troubles.

It even stops abortion. It will stop abortion after some miserable scoundrel has attempted to get rid of the offspring, and she has taken drugs and brought on pains, pains strong enough to expel the contents of the uterus, especially in the first, second and third months.

A little haemorrhage has come on, a mere threatening, the membranes are not yet ruptured, but they soon will be, and she has stinging, burning pains, and lies uncovered and suffers from the heat, probably from the overdose of Ergot.

Apis will overcome this greatly to her regret. This kind of villainy prevails. But women have accidents and weakness. whereby, in spite of the fact that they desire to hold their offspring, they are threatened with abortion, and Apis is a great friend to the prospective mother.

Burning and stinging pains in the ovaries, especially the right; when greatly enlarged and even cystic, Apis has proved a curative remedy, has often cured tumors, and has caused cystic formations to stop growing or to disappear.

The right ovarian region is very sensitive. Pain in the uterus and ovaries before and during menstruation. Stinging, rending, tearing pains cutting like knives, worse from heat.

It is a very easily got symptom, because in most painful symptoms heat or the hot water bag are tried with the natural hope of relief, but with this remedy it aggravates. She throws it aside, for the pain is worse from heat.

"Ovaries enlarged," etc Dropsy of right ovary. Ovarian tumor.

A Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica, John Henry Clarke

Apium virus. Honey-bee poison. N. O. Insecta. Tinctures are made of the whole bee; and of dilutions of the poison with alcohol.

Clinical.─Abscess. Ankles, swelling of. Apoplexy. Asthma. Bladder, affections of. Carbuncle. Chancre. Constipation; of sucklings. Diarrhoea. Diphtheria. Dissection wounds. Dropsy. Ear, erysipelas of. Erysipelas. Erythema nodosum. Eyes, affections of; optic neuritis. Feet, burning of. Gangrene. Gout. Hands, swelling of. Heart, affections of. Heat-spots. Housemaid's knee. Hydrocephalus. Hydrothorax. Injuries. Intermittent fever. Irritation. Jealousy, effects of. Joints, synovitis. Kidney, Bright's disease of. Labia, inflammation of. Laryngitis. Lichen. Meningitis. Menstruation, derangements of. Nettle-rash. Nose, redness of. Operations, effects of. Ovaries pain in; inflammation of; tumours of. Panaritium. Pannus. Peritonitis. Phlebitis. Pleurisy. Prostatitis. Punctured wounds. Red-gum. Rheumatism. Scarlatina. Self-abuse. Suppressed eruptions, effects of. Sycosis. Syphilis. Throat, sore. Tongue, oedema of; ulceration of. Trachea, irritation of. Tumours. Typhus. Urethritis. Urine, abnormalities of. Vaccination. Varicose veins. Variola. Wounds.

Characteristics.─The well-known effects of a bee's sting─burning, stinging, lancinating pain with excessive swelling─give leading keynotes for its employment in a great variety of conditions. In addition to these there is great sensitiveness of the surface to touch. General soreness: "every hair is painful to contact." Great debility as if he had worked hard; is compelled to lie down. Tired and bruised feeling. Great restlessness and fidgetiness (the Arsen. restlessness is more from mental anxiety). Trembling, jerking, and twitching. One half of the body twitching, the other lame or paralysed. Hemiplegia. Apis is more a right-side medicine; symptoms proceed from right to left (Rhus left to right) and from above downwards. In an involuntary proving of Apis in a woman (of forty, strong, florid, of full habit) Who kept bees and was frequently stung without constitutional effect, the following marked and peculiar symptoms were occasionally noted in addition to the better known ones (New. Eng. Med. Gaz., Nov., 1887): Stiffness of lower jaw, soon amounting to a sense of complete fixation. This stiffness extended to tongue and throat, rendering speech difficult and unintelligible, and causing a condition of extreme discomfort, the stiffness being accompanied by a feeling of constriction, which excited a single, spasmodic, backing cough at short intervals. Some difficulty in breathing, especially in inspiration. These symptoms were accompanied by a terrible restlessness. On a later occasion there was dyspnoea, face purple, head thrown back. The same symptoms as above recurred, but the throat was more swollen and the distress extended below the larynx to the upper part of the lung, which soon became very sore and sensitive. An hour after the sting on this occasion a violent cough came on. It seemed to be excited by the constrictive feeling in the throat, but it reached down to the sore place in the lungs, causing great distress. It was a deep, hard, ringing cough, lasting without intermission for three hours. Traces of the cough and soreness lasted for months. Another symptom was an ominous twitching of muscles of extremities controlled by hot foot and hand baths. Ledum gave almost instantaneous relief to the graver symptoms.

The burning symptoms of Apis are distinguished from those of Arsen. in being < by heat. The stinging appears in many diseases and conditions, causing the "crie cérébrale" in acute hydrocephalus and meningitis. Stinging pains in haemorrhoids. "Redness and swelling with stinging and burning pain in eyes, eyelids, ears, face, lips, tongue, throat, anus, testicles." Oedema of the throat may be accompanied with stinging pains, but if the case is more advanced it may be absolutely painless, and then it is more dangerous. (Bapt. has painlessness in throat affections but less oedema.─Nash.)

Apis has slow action and must not be changed too soon. Increased flow of urine shows it is having a favourable effect. The dropsies of Apis are characterised by a waxy hue of skin, whitish or yellowish; transparent swelling of eyelids; bag-like swelling under eyes; surface of body sore, bruised, or burning. In cardiac dropsy the feet swell after walking, and are intolerably sore and burning. In chest affections there is sensation of contraction (Lach.) and inability to lie down. Tension, swelling, and stiffness of limbs. This tight sensation is manifested in another symptom: sensation in abdomen as if something tight would break if too much effort was made to void a constipated stool. Aversion to tight things like Lach. Prostration even to faintness. Paralytic weakness. Paralysis (after diphtheria and other severe diseases). Nervous, restless, over-sensitive; or hot and drowsy, with or without thirst. < From touch or pressure (though the head is > by pressure). In this Apis resembles the Antimonies, and it is like them in sensitiveness to heat, especially to heated rooms (Puls., Iod., Kali iod., Camph., Secale, Sulph.); < by warmth of bed. Cold water >. Many symptoms (eyes and chest) are < in the night, and sleep is disturbed by piercing cries, or else by moaning and whining. < In morning: mucus in mouth, restlessness, diarrhoea. < In evening: erysipelas, giddiness, headache, chills, fever. Many symptoms are < lying down, and > sitting.

Relations.─Compare: Vespa and serpent poisons. Acet. ac. (dropsy); Aco.; Anac. (urticaria); Apoc. can. (dropsy); Arn. (bruised, sore conditions); Ars. (typhoid, gangrene, dropsies, scarlatina, urticaria, chills); Bell. (meningitis, sore throat, erysipelas, scarlatina); Brom. (swelling of ovary during menses); Bry. (meningitis, rheumatism); Canth. (burns, erysipelas, urinary symptoms); Chi.; Colch.; Crot. t. (urticaria); Euphras. (conjunctiva); Fer.; Graph.; Hep.; Hyo.; Iod. (synovitis); Lach.; Lyc.; Merc. Nat. ars.; Nat. mur. (chills, urticaria, tension in ovarian region) Puls.; Rhus (eyes; but Apis has less tendency to suppuration; vesicular erysipelas but darker than Apis and spreading left to right─Apis right to left; typhoid, restlessness, but Apis is more fidgetiness); Rumex (painless, greenish-yellow morning diarrhoea); Sabi.; Sep.; Silic. (ovarian affections with inverted nipples; ulcer on tongue; vaccination effects); Urt. ur.; Zn. Antidotes: to medium doses and poisonings; Nat. mur. in all forms; sweet oil; onions; Ammonia; Ipec., low. (also powdered Ipec. applied locally) Lach.; Ledum. It antidotes: Canth., Iod., Chi., Dig. It follows well: Bry. (when cephalic cry appears); Helleb. (when torpor sets in); Iod., Hep., Merc., Lyc., Sul. Is followed well by: Graph. (tetter on ear lobe); Kali bi. (scrofulous ophthalmia); Arsen. (hydro-thorax); Phos. (diphtheria); Stram. (mania); Lyc. (staphyloma); Sul. (hydrothorax, pleurisy, hydrocephalus); Iod. (swollen knee). Complementary: Nat. mur. (the "chronic" of Apis). Inimical: Rhus in eruptive diseases.

Causation.─Grief. Fright. Rage. Vexation. Jealousy. (The queen bee is the most jealous thing in nature.) Hearing bad news, mental shock. Suppressed eruptions.

SYMPTOMS.

1. Mind.─The brain feels paralysed.─Tubercular meningitis.─Impaired memory.─Absent-minded.─Cannot concentrate thought.─Indifference.─Torpor and apathy.─Awkward, lets things fall and laughs sillily at the mishap.─(The mental symptoms are rich in unconsciousness, absent-mindedness, impaired memory, and slow march of ideas.).─Loss of consciousness.─Great tearfulness; cannot help crying.─Children constantly whining.─Screaming, sudden outcry during sleep.─Busy, restless, continually changing his occupation.─Cannot bear to be left alone.─Hysteria.─In women: jealousy; mania from sexual irritation.─Depression, feels as if about to die (without fear of death).─Delirium, low muttering.─Delirium, after suppressed scarlet eruption.─Irritation.─Premonition of death, thinks it is about to transpire.─Dread of death; sensation as if he could not breathe again.─Fear of being poisoned.

2. Head.─Giddiness: when sitting, standing, lying, when closing the eyes; with nausea and headache.─Congestion to the head, with suppressed menstruation.─Pressing pain in forehead and temples; < rising; in warm bed; > pressing, the forehead together.─The brain feels tired.─Sudden stabbing and stinging pains.─Aching in l. temple.─Hydrocephalus in children, and apoplexy in old persons.─Hydrocephalus; scalp very sensitive; copious sweat of head; child lies in torpor, delirium interrupted by shrill cries, boring head deep in pillow, rolls it from side to side.─Convulsed on one side of the body, paralysed the other; squinting, grinding of teeth, urine scanty (milky).

3. Eyes.─Burning, stinging, shooting, piercing pains in and about the eyes.─Aching over r. eye extending to r. eyeball.─Twitching of eyeballs.─Staphyloma.─Cornea thick, having dark, smoky, spots; greyish, smoky, opaque.─Keratitis.─Conjunctiva reddened, chemosed, lids everted.─Sensation of mucus in the eyes.─Itching in eyes and lachrymation.─Weakness of the eyes, with pain, photophobia, and increased secretions.─Agglutination of the lids.─Oedematous swelling of eyelids; bags under eyes; upper lids hang over like sacs.─Styes with stinging pains; smoky darkness before the eyes.

4. Ears.─Redness and swelling of both ears.─Erysipelas; otitis after scarlatina; hardness of hearing.

5. Nose.─Swollen, red, oedematous.─Coryza, worse from warmth; chronic catarrh with crusty nostrils; polypus.

6. Face.─Oedematous swelling of the face; red and hot, swollen so as to be unrecognisable, with piercing and burning pain; waxy, pale.─Happy expression of face; or terror; or apathy.─Burning, stinging heat in the face with purple colour.─Erysipelas of the face.─Erysipelas of the face, with fever, coated tongue.─Erysipelas going r. to l. (Rhus l. to r.).─Jaws stiff, with stiff tongue and impossibility of intelligible speech.

7. Teeth.─Grinding of the teeth; sudden and involuntary biting them together; covered with yellow mucus or brown sordes.

8. Mouth.─Lips oedematous; upper lip swollen, hot and red.─Mouth red, burning, stinging, scalding.─Dryness of tongue, mouth, and throat; fiery redness of buccal cavity, with painful tenderness.─Dry, swollen, inflamed tongue, with inability to swallow.─White, dry tongue (with diarrhoea).─Tongue: can hardly be protruded; hangs from the mouth; cancer of.─Swollen tongue; shining.─Borders blistered; feel as if scalded and quite raw.─Ulcer in l. border (r. Silic., Thuj.).─Tongue swollen, dry, cracked, sore, ulcerated, or covered with vesicles.─Viscid, tough, frothy, saliva.─Gums sacculated and look watery.─Fetor of breath, with headache.

9. Throat.─Throat has appearance as if stung.─Dryness in the throat with heat, without thirst.─Burning, stinging in throat.─Erysipelatous.─Glossy red varnish.─Inflammation of the throat, with swelling, redness, and stinging pains.─Ulcerated sore throat (in scarlet fever, when the eruption does not come out).─Diphtheritic sore throat gets well as a scarlatina rash develops.─Throat swollen inside and outside; hoarse, sense of constriction; breathing and swallowing difficult.─Ulcers on the tonsils, palate, etc.─Uvula long and dropsical.─Sensation of foreign body or fishbone in the throat; of constriction.─Paralysis.─Small, clear, watery blisters on the back part of the throat.

11. Stomach.─No thirst with the heat.─Thirstlessness (with dropsy).─Vomiting of bile.─Vomiting, with inflammation of the stomach.─Vomiting, with diarrhoea.─Burning heat in the stomach.─Great soreness in pit of stomach when touched.─Violent pain and sensitiveness in region of stomach.

12. Abdomen.─Great sensitiveness of the abdomen to touch.─Soreness of the bowels and abdominal walls; mornings when sneezing or pressing upon them.─Sensitiveness of epigastrium and whole abdomen to touch; of r. inguinal region; across hypogastrium from ilium to ilium.─Pain in abdomen on pressure, touch and horizontal position, with sensitiveness.─Peritonitis.─Erysipelas from contusion.─Rumbling and meteoric distension.─Ascites and anasarca.─Hard swelling in the r. groin, oblong, as large as a cucumber.─Long-standing inguinal hernia.─Collapse of abdominal walls in meningitis infantum.

13. Stool and Anus.─Sensation of rawness in the anus, with diarrhoea.─Discharge of flatus before stool.─Diarrhoea: during fevers; from heat; in debilitated children; from irritability of brain (hydrocephaloid).─Diarrhoea, yellowish-green, with mucus, esp. in the morning.─Stool thin, watery, yellow, < in morning; may or may not be offensive.─Stools smelling very offensively.─Diarrhoea and vomiting.─Diarrhoea is copious, blackish-brown, green, or whitish; orange-coloured; greenish, yellow mucus; yellow watery; soft and pappy, mixed with serum; thin yellow.─At every motion of body bowels act as though he had no power.─Uncertain anus; constantly open (during urination), oozing of liquid (Phos., Phos. ac.).─Swelling of anus.─Haemorrhoids, with stinging pains.─Constipation, with feeling as if something would break if he continued to strain.─Stools involuntary and painless, or painful and urging, olive-green, profuse, and full of red lumps, like chopped beets; bloody, painless; smell brassy or like carrion; very offensive.─Protruding varices, which sting, burn, and smart intolerably.

14. Urinary Organs.─Burning soreness when urinating.─Strangury.─Pain in region of kidneys; soreness on pressure or when stooping.─Frequent desire, with passage of only a few drops.─Urine scanty and high-coloured; with thirstlessness.─Incontinence of urine from coughing and other circumstances.─Urine suppressed.─Too profuse discharge of urine.─Frequent and profuse urination.─Albuminuria of scarlatina.─(Increase of urine under Apis shows that the medicine is acting well.).─Burning and stinging in the urethra.─Burning and smarting in the urethra, as if it were scalded.─Bladder very painful, often tenesmus after urinating.─Urine often bloody, milky appearance; very dark and frothy; very fetid; sediment reddish-brown, like coffee grounds.

15. Male Sexual Organs.─Sexual desire increased.─Chancre with stinging pains like bee-stings, and with a highly inflamed circumference.─Pains and swellings of testes and prostate.─Dropsy of the scrotum and prepuce; hydrocele.

16. Female Sexual Organs.─Amenorrhoea or menorrhagia.─Inflammation, induration, swelling, and dropsy of the ovaries (r.).─Weight and pain in either ovarian region, predominantly r. side.─The ovaries feel better by lying on r. side.─Enlargement of the r. ovary with pain in the l. pectoral region and cough.─Sharp, cutting, stinging pain in the swollen (r.) ovary; worse during menstruation.─Ovarian tumours, with stinging pains like bee-stings.─Metritis, peritonitis, with stinging, thrusting pains.─Pressing-down pain in the uterus.─Bearing-down, with sensation as before menses.─Dropsy of the ovaries (r.); dropsy of the uterus.─Strained pain l. ovary.─Menstruation suppressed or diminished, with congestion to the head.─Labour-like, bearing-down pains, followed by dark, bloody mucus.─Threatened miscarriage in the early months, with heaviness of the abdomen, restlessness, and yawning.─Abortion.─Abortion during the early months.─Dropsy in the latter part of pregnancy attended with puerperal convulsions.─Ulceration and engorgement of os uteri.─Large and painful swelling of the labia, with heat and stinging pains.─Erysipelatous inflammation of the breasts.─Swelling and hardness of the mammae threatening to ulcerate.─Scirrhus or open cancer of the mammae, with stinging, burning pains.

17. Respiratory Organs.─Irritation to cough in the supra-sternal fossa.─Hoarseness.─Hoarseness in the morning.─Respiration hurried and difficult (with fever and headache).─Oedema glottidis.─Asthma; worse in cold weather.─Croupy cough.─Obstinate night cough from 9 p.m., to 4 a.m.─Cough which loosens with difficulty, rouses from sleep before midnight and ceases as soon as least particle is loosened, which is swallowed.─Feeling of constriction causing a single, spasmodic, hacking cough at short intervals.─Violent cough, deep, hard ringing; incessant for three hours; excited by constricted feeling in throat, but reaching down to lungs, the upper part of which are very sore and sensitive.─Dyspnoea; esp. difficult inspiration.

18. Chest.─Hydrothorax.─Sensation of soreness in the chest, as from a bruise.─Oppression of the chest, shortness of breath, esp. when ascending; inability to remain in a warm room.─Dull, aching pain in the l. side of the chest, near the middle of the sternum, with sensation of fulness in the chest and short breath.─Expectoration of copious, transparent, frothy, bloody mucus.─Stitches in l. side of chest and through back.─Burning, stinging pain through entire front of chest.─Melting in region of diaphragm, as from running violently.─Every shock from coughing gives pain in the head and some pain through the chest, as from the clavicle; > after loosening a small portion of mucus, or a large quantity of transparent: frothy, and bloody mucus is expectorated.

19. Heart.─Sudden pain just below the heart, soon extending toward r. chest, with suffocation.─Very feeble action of the heart; violent beats, shaking the whole body; intermittent beats.─Region of heart sensitive to least pressure; rasping sounds of systole and diastole unmistakably audible.─Palpitation of heart from scanty secretion of urine, perfectly cured by establishing the natural quantity.─Pulse: almost imperceptible at wrist; accelerated and full; very frequent and hard; wiry; irregular and slow pulse; intermittent.

20. Back.─Rheumatic pain in back and limbs.─Cerebro-spinal meningitis.

22. Upper Limbs.─Hands bluish, and inclined to be cold.─Oedema of the hands.─Sensation of numbness in fingers, esp. the tips about the roots of nails.─Panaritium with burning, stinging, and throbbing, very sensitive to touch.

23. Lower Limbs.─Cold legs.─Sensation in the toes and whole foot, as if too large; swollen and stiff.─Legs (ankles) and feet waxy, pale, and oedematous.─Burning in the toes with redness; feet cold.─Suppressed perspiration of the feet.─Numbness and coldness of feet, even paralysis.─Dropsy of limbs in diphtheritic albuminuria.─Puffy swelling of the knees.

24. Generalities.─Great debility, as if he had worked hard; he is obliged to lie down.─Sudden "puffing up" of the whole body.─Tired, as if bruised in every limb, and esp. in the back, as after exertion; worse on rising after sitting.─Complete anasarca, no thirst, pale, waxy, almost transparent.─Burning, stinging pains, like bee-stings, occurring occasionally.─Great sensitiveness to touch and pressure (abdomen).─Clonic and tonic spasms.─Sudden weakness with coldness.─Tension (over the eyes in the l. side of head) behind the ears, in the neck.─Dark haemorrhages.

25. Skin.─Oedematous swellings.─Skin usually white, almost transparent (ovarian dropsy).─Hives.─Urticaria like bee-stings, or stings from other insects, with intolerable itching at night.─Carbuncles, with burning, stinging pains.─Eruption like nettle-rash over the whole body.─Erysipelas; with gangrenous spots.─Swelling and dry erysipelatous redness.─Scarlet eruptions.─Body covered with large, elevated, white wheals.─Panaritium (burning, stinging).─Boils and swellings of all descriptions with stinging pains.

26. Sleep.─Much yawning.─Great desire to sleep; extreme sleepiness.─Sleep disturbed by many dreams.─Dreams full of care and toil; of making long journeys; of flying through the air; of hot stones; of walking over hot floors; of walking a long way over wet roads.─Sleep, late in the morning.─Awakens from sleep with a shrill shriek (child suffering from hydrocephalus).

27. Fever.─Pulse full and rapid; small and trembling; intermitting.─Chill, mostly towards the evening (3-4 p.m.).─Chilliness from the least movement, with heat of the face and hands; runs down the back with great prostration.─During hot stage more or less violent headache; generally a continuous deep sleep.─Heat with thirst, wishes to uncover.─Dry heat towards evening with sleepiness.─Sweating stage either absent or of a very light grade.─The sensation of heat is more felt about the pit of the stomach and in the chest.─Perspiration, alternating with dryness of the skin.─Much burning of the skin on various parts of the body.─Thirst wanting during sweat; may or may not be present during heat; always thirst during chill.─Sweat after trembling and fainting, then nettlerash.─After the fever paroxysm, sleep.─Apyrexia: urine scanty; feet swollen; limbs sore; restless; urticaria.

Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of Some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica (Allen's Keynotes), Henry Clay Allen

Poison of the Honey Bee (Apium virus)

Adapted to the strumous constitution; glands enlarged, indurated; scirrhus or open cancer. Women, specially widows; children and girls who, though generally careful, become awkward, and let things fall while handling them (Bov.). Bad effects of acute exanthema imperfectly developed or suppressed (Zinc.); measles, scarlatina, urticaria. Ailments from jealousy, fright, rage, vexation, bad news. Irritable; nervous; fidgety; hard to please. Weeping disposition; cannot help crying; discouraged, despondent (Puls.). Sudden shrill, piercing screams from children while waking or sleeping (Hellebore). Oedema; bag-like, puffy swelling under the eyes (over the eyes, Kali c.); of the hands and feet, dropsy, without thirst (with thirst, Acet. ac., Apoc.). Extreme sensitiveness to touch (Bell., Lach.). Pain: burning, stinging, sore; suddenly migrating from one part to another (Kali bi., Lac c., Puls.). Thirstlessness: in anasarca; acites (Acetic acid, but face more waxy and great thirst). Incontinence of urine, with great irritation of the parts; can scarcely retain the urine a moment, and when passed scalds severely; frequent, painful, scanty, bloody. Constipation: sensation in abdomen as if something tight would break if much effort were used. Diarrhoea: of drunkards; in eruptive diseases, especially if eruption be suppressed; involuntary from every motion, as though anus were wide open (Phos.). Affects right side; enlargement or dropsy of right ovary; right testicle. Intermittent fever; chill 3 p. m., with thirst, always (Ign.); < warm room and from external heat (Thuja, 3 a. m., and at 3 p. m.).

Relations. - Complementary: Nat. mur. Disagrees, when used either before or after Rhus. Ars. and Puls. follow Apis well. Has cured scarlatina albuminuria after Canth., Dig., Hell. failed.

Aggravation. - After sleeping (Lach.); closed, especially warmed and heated rooms are intolerable; from getting wet (Rhus), but better from washing or moistening the part in cold water.

Amelioration. - Open air; cold water or cold bathing; uncovering; pains by coughing, walking or changing position; when sitting erect;

Leaders In Homoeopathic Therapeutics, Eugene Beauharnais Nash

Burning, stinging pains (like bee stings); eyelids; throat, panaritium or felon, haemorrhoids, ovaries, (especially right one), breasts (mastitis), skin (erysipelas, urticaria, carbuncles).

Great oedema; general or local (face, ears, eyelids, especially lower); throat (diphtheria); genitals (especially scrotum); skin (erysipelas and urticaria); everywhere; general anasarca, abdomen. These oedemas are accompanied with the characteristic pains, or no pain at all.

Stupor, with sharp, sudden, shrill cries in brain disease (crie encephalique).

Thirstlessness, especially in dropsies and during heat of intermittents.

Skin alternately dry and perspiring.

Suffocative; feels as if every breath would be his last, especially in dropsical conditions or hot stage of intermittents.

Modalities: < after sleep, on touch (very sensitive), from heat and warm room; > cold room or air and cold applications.

Bad effects from suppressed or retrocedent exanthemata; measles, scarlatina, urticaria.

Involuntary diarrhoea, with sensation as if anus were wide open.

* * * * *

It seems to me that in this remedy also the leading characteristic is to be found in its sensation-burning, stinging pains. They are sharp and quick, like the sting of the bee. These pains are as characteristic of this remedy as are the itching-like chilblains of Agaricus, or the burnings of Arsenicum and Sulphur; but the burning of Apis are relieved by cold, while those of Arsenic are relieved by heat. The stinging appears in many diseases, and kinds of tissue. In the serous membranes or the brain coverings, when we get those "shrill, sudden piercing screams"– "cri cerebrale", which attend such dangerous affections as hydrocephalus, cerebro-spinal meningitis and typhus cerebralis, Apis is the remedy. Again we get these pains in the mucous membranes, as in the throat and haemorrhoids, and the burning is almost always more or less present at the same time. It is also found very prominent in the ovaries. It has proved a very valuable remedy in cancers, even open ones, when this stinging, burning pain was present; also in panaritium. I have seen rapid cures follow its exhibition in felon. Hering put it – "redness and swelling with stinging and burning pain in the eyes, eyelids, ears, face, lips, tongue, throat, anus, testicles". (> by cold applications ought to be added).

So we see how generally the system comes under the action of this remedy. In skin affections, especially the acute exanthems, this is the grand leading symptom, and is especially indicated in affections of the brain and meninges caused by a sudden suppression of skin diseases.

The next general condition for which this remedy seems to be as near specific as any remedy can be is an infiltrated cellular tissue; and oedematous or dropsical condition. This condition obtains almost from the beginning of inflammatory affections and extends to the stage of exudation, and even to chronic dropsical states. In those intensely violent and rapid cases of diphtheria in which the whole throat fills right up with oedematous swelling, the vulva hanging down like a transparent sac filed with water (Kali bichromicum, Rhus toxicod.), and the patient is in imminent danger of death by suffocation from actual closure of the throat and larynx, there is no remedy like Apis. The stinging, burning pains may be present in these cases; or what is more dangerous still, because there is no complaint until the case is far advanced, is an absolutely painless condition, Baptisia has painlessness in throat affections, but the swelling is not so rapid as Apis, and there is no oedema. A number of years ago I was called to Watkins Glen, N. Y., in consultation in a very bad case of diphtheria. One had already died in the family and four lay dead in the place that day. Over forty cases had died in the place and there was an exodus going on for fair. Her attending physician, a noble, white-haired old man, and withal a good and able man, said, when I looked up to him and remarked I was rather young to counsel him: "Doctor, I am on my knees to anybody, for every case has died that has been attacked." The patient was two rooms away from us, but I could hear her difficult breathing even then. Apis was comparatively a new remedy then for that disease, but as I looked into her throat I saw Apis in a moment, and a few questions confirmed it. I told the doctor what I thought and asked him if he had tried it. He said, no he had not thought of it, but it was a powerful blood poison; try it. It cured the case, and not one case that took this remedy from the beginning, and persistently, died. It was the remedy for the genus epidemicus. See my report of this in Vol. XII, Hahnemannian Monthly.

This oedematous condition of Apis may be found in almost any part of the body, but is especially prominent in mouth and throat, eyelids and face, around the eyes (Phosphorus, whole Face); lower lids hang down like bags of water. (Kali carb., upper lids). In erysipelas the swelling of the skin is of this oedematous appearance, and generally with stinging pains.

Sometimes the oedema increases until it forms large blister-like bags of water.

The dropsical effusion may be general or local. It is found in the thoracic cavity, in ovaries, in abdominal cavity, scrotum, and genitals of females. One peculiar symptoms which helps to choose between it and other remedies in dropsy is the almost absolute absence of thirst (with thirst, Acetic acid, Arsenic and Apocynum).

I will now, in addition to what I have written, call attention to some particular affections and symptoms in which Apis should be remembered. A very important symptom not yet mentioned is tenderness or sensitiveness to touch, as if bruised. This is particularly true in the abdominal, uterine, and ovarian regions, but is not by any means confined there, for we may find the whole surface of the body exceedingly sensitive to touch: even the hair seems sore (China officinalis). The condition is often found in cerebro-spinal meningitis and is a strong indication for Apis. In erysipelas this tenderness is often present, and is found under Hepar sulphur, as well as Apis.

The sleep of Apis is either very restless, or in brain diseases there is deep stupor, interrupted occasionally by piercing screams. Never forget Apis then. In all inflammatory affections and in intermittent fevers, if you find the patient alternately dry and hot, or perspiring, think again of Apis.

No remedy has this alternation so strong as Apis. Sensation as if every breath would be his last is very characteristic, and occurs not only in dropsical troubles of the chest, but seems also to be a nervous symptom. In scarlatina Apis is especially indicated if the eruption is retarded or retrocedent and serious brain troubles result, and it is no less efficacious in post-scarlatinal dropsies if the symptoms do not indicate some other remedies.