Saccharum Officinale

Saccharum Officinale.

Sugar. (Including Saccharum album, White Sugar.) Saccharose. C12H22O1l. Trituration. Solution.

Ascites. Cataract. Chlorosis. Cornea, opacity of. Diabetes. Dropsy. Dyspepsia. Hair, rapid growth of. Headache, periodic. Hoarseness. Liver, affections of. Ranula. Rheumatism. Rickets. Scurvy. Spleen, affections of. Tabes mesenterica.

Like so many other articles of diet, Sugar may be a poison and a medicine as well as a food. Sugar preserves food, as salt does; and both sugar and salt have produced scurvy. Cases of scurvy-rickets in bottle-fed children have been traced to excess of sugar in their food; and the exclusion of sugar from the dietary of the gouty, rheumatic, and the diabetic, shows the pathogenetic power it is credited with among practitioners of the present day. Acidity of the stomach and itching at the anus are common effects of taking too much Sugar.

Lippe published "Fragmentary provings and clinical observations obtained principally from S. Boenninghausen and S. E. Bute, who proved the 30th potency on himself" (Allen).

To these symptoms have been added others observed by Swan on a patient who accidentally discovered, after twenty-five years of suffering, that the cause of his trouble was Sugar. All the symptoms disappeared when he abstained from sugar in food or drink, and only reappeared when he took it again by way of experiment. Then, from two to four days after taking sugar, the same train of symptoms invariably occurred in this order: (1) A burning at pit of stomach. (2) A white coat on tongue, so thick as to cause stiffness of it.

(3) Sharp burning pains run up from kidneys to shoulders, passing under scapulae. (4) Pains in bones from head to foot, causing a rigidity of the muscles so that it was impossible to rise from bed till he had been rubbed. (5) Chill commencing in small of back and spreading up and down. Severe headache and occasional vomiting with the chill.

Fever followed with headache, morbid hunger, and a hectic flush. (6) Increased urine, strong odour, white sediment. (7) Great pain in kidneys. (8) Constipation.

(9) Sleeplessness. (10) Oedema of feet and ankles. (11) Weakness of legs, as if paralysed, causing staggering. (12) Painful jactitation of feet and legs during the burning in the Stomach.

(13) Oppression, slight cough, profuse cream-like expectoration, very offensive, cold. Sac. a. 10m and 5m cured him of some remaining symptoms, and the 41m enabled him to eat sugar with impunity. Swan also reports (Org. iii. 342) this case: Miss L. was continually eating candies, of which she was very fond, till her digestive organs were affected. A few doses of Sac. a. 30m changed her taste so that she ate no more, and could not even bear the sight of them.

This case was also cured with Sac. off.: "Vomiting bile, < in night and at 1 a.m.; old-standing dyspepsia, milk, eggs, and bread being the only food tolerated; great longing for sugar, which > the symptoms." Farrington traces a great similarity between Sac. off. and Calc. Sac. off. is indicated, he says, in children who are large-limbed, fat, and bloated, with a tendency to dropsy. It has produced opacity of the cornea, and ought to cure it. The children are dainty and capricious; care nothing for substantial food, but want little "nick-nacks"; always cross and whining, and, if old enough, are insolent, and do not care to occupy themselves in any way.

Everything too much trouble. H. C. Allen relates (H.

P., x. 478) a case of opacity of cornea cured with Sac. a.; and with the same remedy in 2m potency he cured swelling round the ankles following rheumatism. According to Lippe, black-and-tan terrier dogs that eat sugar go blind. The cataract and amblyopia of diabetics are well known. Here, again, Salt and Sugar meet: Burnett has shown in his Supersalinity of the Blood that excess of salt in food has been an important factor in the production of cataract.

The symptoms are < in early morning. < From anger. > In erect position (dyspnoea).

Compare: Sacch. l. In rickets, acidity, fat children, Calc. Craving for sweets, Arg. n., Sul. Rickets, Sil. Diabetes; swelled ankles, Arg. n. Kidney-ache, Santal.

Anger.

Discharge of pus from ears.

Sneezing; dry coryza.

Ulcers in throat.

Rheumatic pain in heart region.—Pulse weak and irregular.

Tingling in limbs.—Emaciation of hands and thighs.

Oedema of arms.

Emaciation with great appetite.—Chlorosis: with dropsy; after anger.—Plethora.—Fainting attacks.—Scurvy rickets in children.—Pains in bones from head to foot.

Sleeplessness.—Starts in sleep.