Hydrocyanicum Acidum
Clarke - Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica · John Henry Clarke · 11,819 chars · source ↗
General
Hydrocyanicum Acidum.
Prussic Acid. HCN. One measure of the dilute acid of B. P. to two measures of rectified spirit makes the 1st centesimal dilution; rectified spirit for all above.
Clinical
Angina pectoris. Asthma. Cholera Asiatica. Colic (horses). Convulsions. Dyspepsia. Epilepsy. Hemiplegia. Hiccough. Labour, convulsions in. Stings. Stomach, catarrh of. Sunstroke. Tetanus. Uraemic convulsions. Whooping-cough.
Characteristics
The pathogenesis of Hcyan. ac. is mainly composed of symptoms observed in poisoning cases and clinically verified, but it has also been proved by Joerg and his pupils. Hcn. is one of the deadliest and most rapidly acting of poisons. Hence its applicability in cases of critical intensity, such as the collapse stage of cholera, when it supervenes on sudden cessation of all discharges; convulsion during severe attacks of illness. It acts powerfully on the coeliac ganglia, causing intestinal cramps and colics.
Convulsions and paralysis are the leading notes of the medicine's action. In the convulsions the body is stiffened and thrown back; cramp in nape of neck is very characteristic; breathing comes in paroxysms; jaws set; foaming at mouth; face flushed, bluish tint. A. H.
Croucher cured a boy, 3 1/2, of convulsions. First attack occurred six months previously. His father's sister had died of epilepsy. Before the fits came on he could walk well, but could not afterwards.
The fits occurred at intervals of about three weeks when a succession of them occurred, each lasting about five minutes, during two or three days. During the intervals between the fits he would generally scream. In the morning on awaking, patient cried out, then convulsions occurred; body and limbs convulsed, eyelids twitched but remained open, eyeballs turned up and to right. Seemed quite unconscious.
Hcn. 2x, one drop three times a day, increased afterwards to two drops and continued for a fortnight. No more convulsions, but three months later a rash developed all over him The characteristic blue tint of Hcn. is apparent after death in some poisoning cases: livid spots on limbs; nails violet. In one case there was a brilliant violent hue all over.
The tetanic spasm of Hcn. is persistent and tonic, and has none of the reflex excitability of the Nux state. Hcn. acts most powerfully on the muscles of face, jaws, and back; the risus sardonicus is pronounced; lividity; frothing. It acts on the medulla and through the vagus nerve on heart and respiration. The breathing is irregular and gasping.
The heart is greatly disturbed; blueness and coldness of surface; pulse feeble, imperceptible. The patient clutches at the heart as if in distress. The prostration of Hcn. is profound: drinks roll audibly into the stomach. It cured a boy of four of fever who had this symptom: "when swallowing a teaspoonful of liquid it sounds like water rolling into an empty barrel." Paralysis attacks first the lower, then the upper limbs.
A dry tearing cough < at night is among the symptoms of Hcn.; and it relieves a similar cough often met with in consumptives. For it must not be imagined that the remedy is only of use in desperate cases of acute illness; it answers to its minute individual symptoms just as truly as does Camph., but it is only those who know the drug in the higher as well as the lower attenuations who will be able to profit by a knowledge of these. "Feels as if a cloud were going over his brain," is a symptom Cash removed with Hcn. in a case of sunstroke.
There is much disturbance of the digestion, which is < after eating. The headache is < at night and the vertigo < in the open air. Coldness is a great feature with the remedy, marble coldness within and without. Blue tinge of the skin is also characteristic.
Relations
The closest analogues are Camph., Lauro., and Amygd. It is antidoted by: Camph., Coff., Ipec., Nux, Op., Ver Compare; Camph. (cholera, coldness); Helod. (coldness); Cicut. (spinal cord; cramp in nape); Con. (paralysis spreading from below upward); Oenanth. (epilepsy); Lauro. (dry tickling cough; Lauro. has also a cough with jelly-like sputa dotted with bloody points); Lach.; Tabac. (asphyxia); Hell., Solania (paralysis of lungs and heart); Nux (tetanus, but of different type).
Mind
Depression; discouragement
Anguish and oppression; anguish in the pit of the stomach; fear of imaginary ills
Very great irritability; sadness; peevish temper: incapacity for labour
Inability to think; memory enfeebled; aversion to all mental fatigue
Could not remain in middle of road when a vehicle approached even at a considerable distance; was forced, as it were, against his will, to stand aside without waiting for it to come nearer (after recovery from poisoning).
Head
Head confused and weighty; giddiness with sinking of the body; giddiness, sometimes with a feeling as of intoxication
Dulness of the senses, sometimes with apparent wavering of objects, and of a veil before the eyes, with difficulty to stand on rising from a stooping or sitting posture; symptoms < in the open air
Vertigo, sometimes with staggering, the patient feels as though something moved in the air and drew him along with it, or else as if everything revolved about him
Feels as if a cloud were going over his brain (cured in a case of sunstroke)
Cephalalgia with vertigo; stunning cephalalgia, dull pain in the forehead, beginning at the temples
Head heavy and stupid
Headache, only at night
Pressive cephalalgia in the forehead, or else at the occiput to the l. towards the forehead
Violent headache in sinciput and occiput, from vertex to forehead and orbits of the eyes; in the side of the head (r. or l.) esp. in vertex and forehead; at different parts of the head
Tension in frontal region
Shootings in the head, sometimes in one place, sometimes in another.
Eyes
Eyes half open; reversed; protruding from the head; immoveable; difficulty to move the eyeballs
Pupils dilated and immoveable; insensible to light
Eyelids wide open, immoveable, as if paralysed; spasmodic quivering in the upper eyelids
Dimness of sight; cloudiness and mist (gauze) before the eyes; amaurotic blindness.
Ears
Aching in the interior of both ears; sometimes with roaring (buzzing) and ringing.—Hardness of hearing.
Nose
Smarting in the upper part of nostrils
Dilation of the alae nasi, which have a bluish tint
Dryness of the nose.
Face
Puffing of the face; oval visage; visage wears a look of age; pale and bluish; complexion earthy and grey
Expression of beatitude in the countenance
Contortion of corners of mouth; trismus; frightful contraction of the facial muscles.
Mouth
Dryness of mouth
Augmented secretion of saliva
Tongue coated, sometimes white, afterwards dark and dingy; contraction at the root; sensation of coldness on the tongue; burning at the tip of the tongue paralysis and stiffness of the tongue, which often protrudes from the mouth loss of speech
Pains in the palate; inflammation of the palate.
Throat
Spasms in the back part of the throat, and the oesophagus.—Scraping in the throat, and in the gullet painful scraping in the throat; heat in the throat and in the oesophagus burning in palate, throat, and oesophagus; inflammation of the throat, and of the oesophagus.
Stomach
Taste: sweetish; fetid, acrid, and irritating; much gas in the mouth, with taste of prussic acid
Anorexia, repugnance to food
Adypsia, with heat throughout the body; ardent thirst
Loathing, inclination to vomit; vomiting of a black liquid
Pains in stomach; sensation of coldness in stomach, sometimes with lancinations; pressure and squeezing in pit of stomach, with great oppression
Fluids enter stomach with gurgling noise
Great sinking at pit of stomach
Spasmodic contractions in the stomach
Heat and burning in stomach
Inflammation of the stomach and intestines
Pulsative pain in the precordial region.
Abdomen
Coldness of the whole abdomen (with stitches), sometimes alternated with burning.—Rumbling and borborygmi in the abdomen; flabby inflation of the abdomen.
Stool And Anus
Involuntary stools
Involuntary stools, hiccough, and great prostration
Sudden cessation of all discharges
Cholera sicca.
Urinary Organs
Retention of urine; frequent emission of urine; copious emission of an aqueous urine, pale or a pale yellow, depositing a turbid cloud
Urine with sediment thick and reddish
Involuntary emission of urine
Burning in the urethra.
Respiratory Organs
Painful scraping and burning in the larynx; inflammation of the larynx; sensation of swelling of the larynx; constriction of the throat; tickling in the larynx, sometimes lancinations and draggings; roughness and hoarseness of the voice
Loud voice
Frequent coughing, caused by smarting (pricking) in the larynx and trachea
Haemoptysis
Respiration rattling, groaning, slow, very difficult, with mucous rale
Difficulty of respiration by reason of the lancinations in the larynx
Want to breathe deeply
Respiration profound, frequent, and stertorous
Anxious respiration
Paralysis of the lungs.
Chest
Oppression of the chest, asthma, sometimes painful
Feeling of suffocation, with severe pains in the chest
Great oppression and constriction of the chest
Sharp pains in the chest
Aching in r. side of chest
Lancinations in the l. side, below inferior cartilage of sternum or thereabout, in the chest, on breathing deeply.
Heart
Pains and pressure in the region of the heart
Palpitations of the heart
Irregular movements of the heart; feeble action of the heart.—(Angina pectoris; sudden outcry; long fainting spells; suffocation with torturing pains in chest; irregular, feeble heart-movements.)
Generalities
Speedy failing and weakness of the limbs, esp. of the thighs; extreme weakness and weariness; nervous weakness Spasms; spasms at the back; spasms of face and jaws; convulsions Paralysis of inferior extremities, afterwards of the upper ones; loss of sensation, then stiffness of the parts; trembling and staggering, immobility, insensibility; stiffness of the body Cataleptic attacks; great flexibility of the limbs; pulsations of the heart become slower, weaker, less appreciable, until lethargy supervenes; diminution of vital heat
Muscles of back and face principally affected Activity of the senses stimulated; internal feeling of ease; gentle languor with sensation of agreeable weariness Dulness of the senses, and insensibility to external influences; disappearance of all pain; insensibility; loss of consciousness; wandering of the senses; shivering and lassitude.
Skin
Itching in various places, esp. between the chin and lips
Small red pustules on hip; burning itching vesicles on upper extremities, and neck
Dryness of the skin
General pallor with a bluish tint
Varicose ulcers on legs.
Sleep
Frequent yawning, sometimes with shuddering and spasm of the skin
Drowsiness, sometimes uncontrollable, or else after a meal; heavy sleep in the morning; continued inclination to sleep; coma vigil; somnolency
Wakefulness; to sleep is difficult, almost impossible; frequent awakening
Lively dreams, without connection; anxious, disquieting dreams, dreams of death.
Fever
Chilliness; frequent shudderings, esp. after midnight or in the morning; shivering, with yawning or with thirst
Coldness of the limbs; sensation of cold internally and externally
Coldness within and without
Fever, shivering, afterwards burning heat; heat in the head, with coldness of the extremities, heat and sweat over the whole body, in the afternoon; general febrile agitation, with intense excitement; heat, at intervals, and irregular motion of the heart
During the shivering, giddiness and vertigo; during the shudderings, mist before the sight.