Cactus grandiflorus
Tincture of youngest and
tenderest stems and flowers collected in summer.
Characteristics.
Cactus affects powerfully the entire
organism, but its intensest operation is on the heart and circulation.
In congestive violence it rivals Acon.,
which is one of its antidotes.
As with Acon., too, the pains are
unendurable, they extort screams.
Sadness, apprehension, fear of death and
a tendency to be easily frightened characterize the Cactus mental state, as
they do many conditions of heart disease.
Given as an organ-remedy it will benefit
a large number of cases of weakened and painful heart, and if its keynote
symptom of constriction-"as if an iron band prevented its normal
movements," or "heart as if compressed violently and as violently
struggled to burst its bonds"-is present, it will cure.
Pain and numbness in left arm
accompanying heart disease.
Sharp pains in diaphragm and girdle pain
round its attachment.
Indigestion with these symptoms.
Snader considers Cactus specially
indicated where the heart is weak and the arteries atheromatous.
Causation.
Sun.
Damp.
Love disappointment.
Mind.
Sadness and bad humor, taciturnity,
melancholy, hypochondriasis.
Cries, knows not why, worse by
consolation.
Screaming with pain.
During menses, hysteria.
Fear of death, belief that his disease is
incurable.
Love of solitude.
Head.
Vertigo, from sanguineous congestions to
head.
Heavy pressing in the head as if a great
weight lay on the vertex, better from pressure, worse from noise (even talking)
and light.
Throbbing pain with sensation of weight
and violent neuralgias in right side of head, periodic.
Feeling as if head compressed in a vice,
and would burst from severity of pain.
Eyes.
Dimness of sight, cannot see at a
distance, objects seem obscured.
Ears.
Hearing diminished by the buzzing in the
ears.
Pulsations in the ears (otitis).
Nose.
Profuse epistaxis, soon ceasing.
Face.
Paleness of the face.
Bloated and red, with pulsations in head.
Prosopalgia, right-sided, chronic, worse
from slightest exertion, bearable only when lying still in bed, brought on by
wine, music, strong light, missing dinner at usual hour.
Mouth.
Loss of taste for food with nausea.
Tongue purple, thick brown sordes on
teeth.
Prickling on point of tongue.
Breath very offensive.
Throat.
Feeling of warmth about throat and chest.
Constriction of oesophagus, which
prevents swallowing.
Constriction of throat exciting a
constant desire to swallow.
Suffocative constriction at throat with
full, throbbing carotids.
Scraping sensation at soft palate.
Stomach.
Appetite good, digestion weak.
Complete loss of appetite, stomach
rejects everything.
After eating, weight and distress in
stomach.
Nausea in the morning, lasting all day.
Acrid, sour fluid in stomach which rises
in throat and mouth.
Frequent vomiting.
Copious hematemesis.
Burning pulsation or heaviness in
stomach.
Constriction or pulsation in scrobiculus.
Gastro-enteritis.
Abdomen.
Pulsation in the celiac artery (after
dinner), burning extends down from it in flashes.
Sharp pains shooting through diaphragm and up
into chest.
Colic with loose stool.
Insupportable heat in abdomen.
Pain and bearing-down in lower abdomen.
Stool and Anus.
Constipation, stool hard and black.
Diarrhoea, watery, mucous, bilious (in
forenoon).
Sensation of great weight (in anus), and
urging to evacuate a great quantity, but nothing passes.
Copious hemorrhage from the bowels (from
the anus).
Itching in the anus.
Fluent hemorrhoids.
Fistula in ano with violent palpitation
of heart.
Urinary Organs.
Constriction of neck of bladder.
Irritation in urethra, as if he would
pass water constantly.
Urine passes by drops, with much burning.
Profuse urine, of a straw color.
Urine, on cooling, deposits a red sand.
Hematuria, urination prevented by clots.
Frequent urging, at night, with a copious
flow each time.
Male Sexual Organs.
Prostatic affections, weight in anus.
Female Sexual Organs.
Pulsating pain in uterus and ovaries.
Constriction in uterine region, round
pelvis.
Constriction of vagina preventing coition
(vaginismus).
Very painful menstruation, extorting loud
cries.
Menses too early, scanty menstruation,
ceasing while lying.
Labor suppressed.
Breast, tumour in, inflammation of.
Respiratory Organs.
Difficulty of breathing, attacks of
suffocation with fainting.
Chronic bronchitis, with rattling of
mucus.
Spasmodic cough and copious mucous
expectoration.
Pricking pains in chest with oppressed
respiration (pneumonia).
Oppression of breathing in going
upstairs.
Catarrhal cough with much viscid
expectoration.
Much rattling of mucus.
Cannot lie in a horizontal position.
Periodical suffocation, with fainting,
and sweat on face and loss of pulse.
Hemoptysis, with convulsive cough.
Sharp pains shooting from body to back
and up into chest, with sensation of rush of blood to chest (rheumatism of
diaphragm).
Chest.
Difficulty of breathing, continued
oppression and uneasiness as if the chest were constricted with a (hot) iron
band, hindering respiration.
Whirling sensation from chest to brain,
arterial throbbing.
Oppressed breathing from a weight on
chest.
Congestion of the chest which prevents
lying down, palpitation, constriction as from a tight cord around false ribs.
Sensation of a great constriction in
middle of sternum, as if the parts were compressed by iron pincers, with
oppression of breathing, worse on motion.
Heart and Pulse.
Pain deep in heart like a jerking body,
frequently repeated.
Something seemed to be whirling up from
chest to brain.
Sensation as if heart turned over, as if
it whirled round, as if some one was grasping heart firmly, with sensation as
if it whirled round, as if heart was bound down and had not room enough to
beat, as if bolts were holding it, as if compressed or squeezed by a band.
Lancinating pain in heart when
perspiration fails.
Deathlike feeling at heart and round to
left back.
Acute pains, pricking and stitches in the
heart.
Palpitation of the heart, day and night,
worse when walking, and at night, when lying on left side.
Palpitation in small irregular beats (at
times frequent, at others slow), from slightest excitement or deep thought,
with necessity for deep inspiration.
Pains in apex of heart, shooting down
left arm to ends of fingers, feeble pulse, dyspnea.
Endocardial murmurs, excessive impulse,
increased precordial dulness, enlarged ventricle.
Heart disease with edema of left hand
only.
Aneurism.
Atheromatous arteries.
Neck and Back.
Exophthalmic goiter.
Cold in back and icy cold hands.
Rheumatism of shoulder.
Pain under left shoulder-blade (with
palpitation).
Lumbar muscles tender on pressure and
stiff, especially on first moving after repose.
Limbs.
Rheumatic pains, in shoulders, upper and
lower arms, in hips down to feet, worse in rest and in motion, and in all
positions.
Upper Limbs.
Pain in shoulders and arms.
Sore aching in left arm down to elbow,
down to fingers.
Numbness of left arm.
Formication and weight in arms.
Edema of the hands, worse in the left
Lower Limbs.
Restlessness of legs, cannot keep them
still.
Edema of the feet, extending to the
knees, the skin is shining, pressure with the fingers leaves an indentation.
Generalities.
General weakness and prostration of
strength.
Sensation of constriction: in throat,
chest, heart, bladder, rectum.
Hemorrhages: from nose, lungs, rectum,
bladder, stomach.
Congestions.
Skin.
Dry, scaly herpes on the outside of the
elbow, and on the right internal malleolus.
Sleep.
Sleeplessness without cause, or from
arterial pulsations in the scrobiculus, and in the right ear.
Dreams: frightful, lascivious.
Fever.
Slight chilliness towards ten AM..
Chilliness, with chattering of the teeth.
Chilliness not relieved by covering, 11
aand 11 p-m.
Burning heat, with shortness of breath.
Scorching heat at night, with headache,
following a chill and terminating in perspiration.
Coldness in back and icy cold hands.
Intermittent fever (quotidian) recurring
every day at the same hour (for many successive days
