Mirza Tahir Ahmad James Tyler Kent
Psorinum is prepared from the sinister material obtained from the skin lesions of chronic psoriasis. Psorinum is a vastly effective and powerful remedy. Regarding its efficacy against various diseases, Psorinum is similar to Sulphur. However, with regards to sensitivity to heat and cold, it is just the opposite of it. Sulphur by nature is very hot, whereas Psorinum by nature is very cold. If a patient shows all the symptoms of Sulphur but is cold by nature, then Psorinum will be the ideal treatment instead of Sulphur. Both Sulphur and Psorinum produce powerful effects on the skin and the glands. In both, the excretions stink and the body appears unclean and filthy as if the patient has not taken a bath for a long time. Sulphur and Psorinum are topnotch homoeopathic remedies for the treatment of severe skin diseases, which have become suppressed due to the use of strong, forceful allopathic treatment, and are now adversely affecting the intestines and the inner linings. In these conditions, Sulphur and Psorinum are both equally important. These skin diseases exhibit similar symptoms, though they react quite differently to heat and cold. Irrespective of cold and heat, Psorinum proves to be very effective against certain dangerous diseases not amenable to Sulphur, for example, the cancer of the root of animal horns. It is a very dangerous type of cancer killing the animal within few days. Many a time, a single dose of Psorinum 1000 will, by the grace of God, cure the disease, although it is considered incurable.
A Psorinum patient feels very cold and likes to cover himself with a quilt. However, when the patient becomes a little warm in the bed, itching starts. Despite some similarity in the mode of action between Psorinum and Sulphur, both differ widely from each other in their nature.
A unique totally unrelated feature of Psorinum, not shared by any other remedy including Sulphur, is that strands of the hair in young children start turning grey. I have yet to see a remedy better than Psorinum in the treatment of this condition. Soon after the treatment with Psorinum 1000, every week for a few weeks, black hair starts to grow from the roots. The upper part of the hair that has become grey cannot become black again. But the newer, lower part of the hair grows as black. I do not know with any certainity if Psorinum could also be helpful in turning the colour of grey hair of advanced age back into black. On rare occasions it has been seen that after becoming grey due to ripe old age, hair starts growing black again. I myself have seen many women whose hair turned black after becoming grey due to old age. God only knows the functioning of this mechanism. If a homoeopathic doctor could find a sure shot remedy by which the grey hair of old people could turn black, then that doctor might become the richest person in the world. I invite everybody to do more research on this project using Arnica and Psorinum. It is possible that this prescription may work in old people of cold constitution.
The skin diseases of Psorinum resemble those of Graphites. In both of these, the eczema is marred with scabs, underneath which very foul smelling pus is formed and the eczema continues afresh. In Psorinum, the foul smell from the wounds is distinctly more pronounced than Graphites and other remedies. It is simply unbearable. There is severe itching in the wounds, which bleed on scratching. The skin becomes dry and dirty. Scaly bumps develop over the entire body that are resistant to healing.
In Psorinum, the eyelids are swollen and sticky. The margins of the eyelids become red and swollen, as in several other remedies. If the disease becomes worse and the eyes become disfigured, Alumina or Alumen can prove to be ideal remedies, especially Alumina, which is very powerful and effective in this respect. If the eyes become inflamed and develop lumps, then Aesculus would be better than Alumina. Most of the eye diseases can improve with these or similar remedies. Sometimes, the eyelids swell and turn outwards, exposing the inner red surface (ectropion). The eyes look dreadful. The eyelashes start to fall. For all these symptoms, Psorinum, Hepar Sulph and Alumina are very high-rated remedies.
In Psorinum, the patient suffers from recurrent nasal cold. The nose gets blocked. Despite blockage of the nasal passages, thin yellowishgreen fluid runs from the nose, slightly relieving the burning sensation. In view of the changing forms of the influenza virus, Psorinum remains effective only for a short while and then loses its effect. The reason is that the symptoms of the disease keep on changing. Therefore, it is not possible to depend on one or two remedies alone for the entire treatment of catarrhal diseases. It becomes imperative to change the treatment when the symptoms change.
Psorinum is the remedy for people of cold constitution. It acts rapidly against the diseases caused by cold. Furthermore, Psorinum has the capability to surface the suppressed diseases out. Even if Psorinum cannot cure the patient, it helps the physician in treating the patient with other remedies by exposing the symptoms related to a particular remedy. One should not be afraid if Psorinum became ineffective after being effective for a short while, this does not mean that the diagnosis was wrong. It is a characteristic of Psorinum that it is effective for a short while and then becomes ineffective. However, after a while, if the patient is put back on Psorinum again, it picks up its previous effectiveness.
A Psorinum patient is always hungry, especially at night. Characteristically, hunger wakes him up in the latter part of the night. Food makes the patient feel better. A Sulphur patient does not feel hungry at night or in the morning, however, after sunrise, around 11a.m., the patient feels extremely hungry by way of severe craving in the stomach.
In Psorinum, the headache alternates with nasal catarrh. In this condition, Bryonia and Rhus Tox are also effective. In Psorinum, the cough is dry. Phlegm does not form at all. Usually such a cough is very troublesome. At the beginning of the disease, Aconite, Belladonna and Arsenic benefit the patient. However, these remedies do not offer a permanent cure. For symptoms developing later, some other remedies should be looked for. It is important to keep a constant watch on the patient and then change the remedies as frequently as the symptoms change. However, the remedies conforming to the patient’s constitution usually cure the patient permanently. These need not be changed.
In Psorinum, sores develop at the angles of the mouth. The tongue and the gums feel painful constantly. The teeth become loose and start to shake. Often due to some kind of severe infection, despite the fact that the gums have become diseased, symptoms of pain, inflammation and fever do not develop. Bacteria erode the gums from the inside. Similar symptoms are also found in Baptisia i.e. there is severe throat infection, to the extent that the tonsils start to necrose, yet the patient does not feel any pain.
Sometimes, a Psorinum patient experiences a sudden urge to pass stools. The slightest delay may result in soiling the clothes.
The constipation of Psorinum resembles that of Bryonia and Graphites. Sometimes, despite loose motions, there is difficulty in excretion of the faeces, because the peristaltic movements of the intestines become sluggish. The symptom of difficulty in excretion of the faeces is also found in Alumina, China and Nux Moschata. In the diarrhoea of Psorinum, the stools contain undigested food particles. Moreover, the patient urinates frequently. It is a symptom of weakness of the urinary bladder and is not due to diabetes.
Psorinum is very effective against certain diseases of the prostate. Psorinum is also effective against cancer of the prostate, though, for this disease, Silicea CM is the most effective remedy. During the last few years, Silicea CM has been tried for the treatment of prostate cancer and found to be very effective. After treating with one dose of Silicea CM, the benefit may stop. The remedy may then be repeated after a short interval. However, it should not be repeated without reason. In the treatment of cancers anywhere in the body, if necessary a high potency of Silicea can be repeated sooner. However, while the first dose is still effective, the second dose should not be given unnecessarily. Generally, Psorinum is beneficial in the treatment of weakened heart muscles, severe pain which is relieved by lying down and inflammation of the covering membrane of the heart (pericarditis). One symptom of Psorinum is that the pulse is very weak and difficult to feel.
Psorinum is beneficial in the treatment of women’s diseases only if the symptoms of feeling cold and the foul smell of the discharges are conspicuous.
In Psorinum, sexual urge decreases and there is a complete loss of libido. This symptom is found in Graphites also. Apparently, by nature, Psorinum is a cold and dry remedy, yet the body temperature rises very high in the fever of a Psorinum patient. A patient sweats as if steaming. Despite sweating, the patient’s body temperature does not subside. The patient experiences scary dreams, feels very thirsty and cannot go to sleep due to unbearable itching.
The Psorinum diseases become worse with cold and during the change of weather. A whiff of cold air becomes unbearable to the patient. Eating food gives only short relief. In the open air, the cough and itching subside.
Adjuvants: Sulphur, Alumina
Potency: 200 or higher. Sometimes, the first dose produces its effect after nine to ten days. Therefore one should wait at least that long to see its effect.
by Mirza Tahir Ahmad
PSORINUM
Psorinum is closed allied to Sulphur.
Skin: The patient dreads to be washed. The skin over the body, especially of the face, looks filthy, though it has been well washed. A dingy, dirty, foul look, as if covered with dirt.
Skin rough and uneven, cracks easily, bleeding fissures; it becomes rough and scaly. He cannot wash it clean. The skin of the hands is rough, chaps easily, becomes thick and scaly, easily cracks; breaks out in little scaly, eruptions; looks unwashed; he always appears to have dirty hands.
Many of the complaints of the skin are worse from bathing and from the warmth of the bed. The skin itches when warm; itches when wearing woolens. Itching when warm in bed; he scratches until the part becomes raw, and then it becomes scabby. When healing takes place there is itching and then it becomes scabby. When healing takes place there is itching and then he has to scratch. Legs and arms raw and scabby from scratching. Violent itching from the warmth of the bed, even, without any eruption.
The skin is unhealthy, looks dirty, dingy, studded with capillary blood vessels and enlarged veins. This is the state before the eruption appears. Scabs form from scratching and then comes the eruption.
Papules, pimples, crusts, boils, vesicles, and eruptions ooze a watery moisture. When the eruption has gone on for some time the crusty formation and vesicles mingle; the skin becomes thickened and indurated, and new crops come out under the old crusts; rawness, itching, tingling, crawling, bleeding eczema of the scalp and face; the crusts cover the scalp; the hair falls out; the oozing lifts up the crusts and exposes new vesicles; it looks like raw beef, and it tingles so that the child cannot keep its fingers off it; worse at night, worse from the warmth of the bed, worse from warm applications, anything that would keep the air away from it; ameliorated by cool air and worse from covering. This is the opposite of the general Psorinum state, which is aggravated from the open air. He has an aversion to open air.
The eruption goes on, spreads, and the true skin becomes elevated, thickened, indurated, with an increased vascularity and redness. The oozing is offensive like carrion or decomposed meat; nauseating odor from the oozing fluid.
Offensiveness runs through Psorinum in such a characteristic way that is worth while mentioning it here; foetid odors, foetid breath discharges and oozing from the skin smelling like carrion; stool so offensive that the odor permeates the whole house, in diarrhea, summer complaint, cholera infantum; perspiration foetid; leucorrhoea abominably offensive; eructations taste as if be had eaten bard boiled eggs and they had spoiled, and they smell so to others; stool flatus, and eructations smell like spoiled eggs; offensive to sight and smell is the subject who needs this medicine.
The skin grows increasingly thick and bleeds, and the eruption spreads to other parts. Eruptions on the lips, on the genitals; very offensive; soreness and rawness about the anus; the vulva ulcerates and is very offensive; ulcers on the legs; on the tibia; on the backs of the hands; on the dorsum of the foot; behind the ears and upon the ears; over the scalp; over the cheek bones; on the wings of the nose and on the nose and eyelids.
Greasy skin. The eruption is accompanied by redness of the mucous membranes of the nose, mouth, lips and eyes. Eyelids thickened and turned out, like ectropion; granulation and induration of mucous membranes, so that they become like gristle; redness and ulceration. Ulceration of the cornea; lachrymation; turning out of the lids with loss of the eyelashes.
Eyes and nose: He looks frightful with his red eyes, eruption on the face, red skin oozing a thick yellow discharge. In the early stages the oozing is a whitish thin or whitish thick moisture. In old eruptions ulceration takes place beneath the crusts and there is a thick, yellow, purulent discharge. Yellow green discharge from the eyes and nose. Horribly offensive discharge from the nose; gluey discharge from the nose; offensive like Merc., Sil., Calc. p., Hep.
Accumulation of foetid pus in the eyes. Coryza with thick, yellow discharge. Always taking cold. In the coryza, the nose dries up part of the time and runs part of the time; he must use the handkerchief continually; must blow the nose all the time.
In the early stages of the coryza he blows it all the time, but there is no discharge or relief. This state is so marked that some think of it as a continuous hay fever, which runs all the year and rippens up in the Fall.
It is closely related to hay fever; stuffing up of the nose in the Fall; catarrhal state of the eyes and nose. Hay fever is one of the most difficult conditions to fit a remedy to. It belongs to a low constitution which must be built up before the hay fever will cease.
It is an expression of psora which comes once a year, and the psoric miasm must be changed. In a few years most subjects can be changed, but not in one season, so do not be disappointed. In catarrhal states, hay fever often dates back to low fever improperly treated.
The Psorinum patient himself is one of debility. He wants to go home after a short walk. He is worse in the open air. He cannot breathe in the open air; cannot breathe while he is standing up; wants to go home and lie down so that he can breathe.
Asthma: or cardiac dyspnoea, when the patient wants to go home and lie down so that he can breathe. Usually this condition is relieved by sitting up and from the open air. Not so with Psorinum, he wants a warm place and to he down and to be let alone.
Psorinum is slowed down in all of its functions; a state of paretic weakness. He does not rally after a fever; his digestion is slow; the stool is normal, yet it requires a great effort to expel it; the bladder is full of urine, yet it passes slowly and he feels that some remains; he can never finish stool or urination; he has to go back several times. Although the stool is soft and perfectly normal it cannot be expelled at one sitting.
A psoric patient comes down with typhoid; the typhoid has been arrested or has run its course and it is time for convalescence. The fever has subsided, but the patient has no appetite; he does not convalesce; he wants to lie down and does no desire to, be moved; he is worse when sitting up, lies upon his back; he has troublesome breathing and lies with his arms abducted from his side, thrown across the bed; this relieves his breathing and allows the chest to operate properly; so tired and so weak; one dose of Psorinum will cause a reaction, stop his sweat, increase his appetite, cause better breathing.
The Psorinum complex of symptoms is one in which remedies cause improvement but a short time and then the symptoms change and another remedy must be selected. It is a state of feeble reaction.
Mind: The mental symptoms present some strong features. Sadness, hopeless; he sees no light breaking through the clouds above his head; all is dark about him.
He thinks his business is going to be a failure; that he is going to the poor house; that he has sinned away his day of grace. It is a fixed idea during the day and he dreams about it at night. Overwhelming sadness; dejection; he takes no joy in his family; feels that these things are hot for him.
His business is prosperous, yet he feels as if he were going to the poor house. No joy or realization of benefit . Extremely irritable, wants to be alone. Does not want to be washed.
Full of anxiety, even of suicide. Despair of recovery his sick. Though there is no eruption at night he is driven to despair by the continual itching. If he throws the covers off then he becomes chilly; if he covers up, then there is itching.
Sensitive to cold yet the skin is worse from heat. Tingling, itching, formication, crawling like ants running over the surface, as of insects in the skin.
Especially suited to broken down individuals, who have vertigo as soon as they go into the open air; become dizzy and want to go home. and lie down; afraid they will lose their breath.
Head: Old chronic periodical headaches with hunger, and often the hunger lasts during the whole headache; must get up at night for have something to eat.
The headache is sometimes improve by eating. If he goes without a meal he has a headache.
Violent rush of blood to the head, hot face, hair wet with the perspiration, hunger. Every one, two, or three weeks a recurrent headache. Every time the air blows on his head it slacks up the catarrh and a headache comes on.
Either coryza or headache from catching cold. Headache is violent, throbbing, pecking as of little hammer, red face, hot head-congestive at times sweat. Hungry headache in such as have a dry cough in winter. Dry, teasing, racking cough with no expectoration. If the cough ceases he has a periodic headache. So complaints alternate. Head ache goes and cough appears or eruption in winter alternating with headache.
Scalp cold; wears fur cap in summer; worse uncovering the head (Sil.), worse front getting the hair cut (Bell., Glon., Sep.). Hepar is also worse from cold.
Salt rheum, psoriasis in winter. Dry, cold weather, cold wet weather; washing in cold water; dish washing, aggravate the salt rheum.
"Hair dry, lusterless, tangles easily, glues together; must comb it continually."
Ears: Chronic offensive otorrheoa; thick, purulent, offensive, yellow discharge from the ears; smells like stinking meat; continuous discharge; eruptions about and behind ears. Discharge resulting from scarlet fever; abscess in middle ear; otitis media; rupture of drum; prolonged discharge from such all abscess; foetid discharge.
"Otorrheoa with headache; thin, ichorous and horribly offensive like spoiled meat; very offensive, purulent; brown, offensive from left ear, for almost four year."
Otorrheoa associated with watery, offensive diarrhea. Scurfs in ears, and humid scurfs behind cars.
Teeth and mouth: Rigg's disease; the teeth become loose; the gums settle away, spongy, bleed easily, humid, blue, the teeth fall out.
Ulcers about the tongue and mouth; ulcers as found in infancy; aphthae, thrush; ulcerated sore mouth, sore throat, chronic ulcers of throat. Chronic thickening and elongation of the uvula.
Enlargement of tonsils, parotids and submaxillary glands; they become hard and tender to touch; swelling from taking cold. Glands of the neck sore.
Abdomen: Chronic abdominal affections with disturbances of stool.
He will strain to pass a soft stool (Nux moshata., Alumina).
Chronic diarrhea; horribly offensive; frequent stool day and night (unlike Sulphur, the remedy it most resembles). He must go several times to pass a normal stool.
Chronic vomiting; ulcer of the stomach, distension of stomach are commonly associated. Always sour belching, sour stomach. Vomiting of blood and bloody stools. This is not strange, because Psorinum has a tendency to hemorrhages, especially from the uterus.
Women: All sorts of menstrual disorders, especially a prolonged menstruation. When a woman has passed through an abortion and the placenta has come away, but every few days a little gush of fresh, bright red blood and clots, or going days and weeks with a little oozing of bright red blood; every time she gets on her feet there is a new start of the flow; no tendency to permanent recovery.
Two remedies that fit this state are Sulphur and Psorinum. A marked state of relaxation, sub-involution. The uterus does not go back to its normal size and there is this tendency to bleed; a state of inertia.
Soft stool, passed with difficult do not forget this. Obstinate constipation. Haemorrhage from the rectum.
Cholera infantum; often in the early days the stool is horribly offensive, slimy, undigested; there is vomiting and prolonged weakness and the whole child has an offensive odor; child dirty; nose sunken in (Ant. t.), sunken, countenance. Psorinum causes reaction and cures, or brings the child into such a condition that a simple remedy completes the cure.
It is not the sourness of Hepar; in spite of washing, the child smells so sour; like sour milk; the diaper, urine, and faeces and perspiration are sour. This is a strong general feature of Hepar. The stool smells like spoiled eggs, so also the eructations and flatus. The offensiveness of the stool is horrible, but not so permeating as Bapt., which is thick and clay-like, while the Psorinum stool is watery, brown, gushing and may be bloody.
Chronic diarrhea, early morning, urgent. Hot flatus, burning the anus; smells of spoiled eggs, Arn. and Staph. Involuntary stool at night (China has a black, profuse, watery stool at night and after meals.)
In Psorinum, we find the haste of sulphur, the flatulence of Olean. and Aloe, and difficulty of expelling a soft stool like Alumina, China and Nux mosch.
Men: There is prostration in some Psorinum cases; prostration of the genitals.
It is not such an unusual thing in the female to have aversion to sexual intercourse, but man is not often subject to the complaints that cause aversion to coition. Yet we have in man as well as in the woman actual aversion or a state of no enjoyment. He can perform the act and he has no difficulty in obtaining an erection, so it is not impotence, but there is no enjoyment. Impotence comes later.
"Absence of erections; parts flabby, torpid."
"Aversion to coition; impotence; want of emission during coitus."
"Prostatic fluid discharged before urinating."
Old gleet, painless discharge; the "last drop;" relaxed and cold genitals; a drop of white or yellow pus after a well selected remedy. (Sepia, Sulphur, Alumina, Psorinum.) Psorinum is indicated above all others if there is an unusually offensive state of the genitals, Thuya, if the odor is of a nauseating, sweet character; warts exposed by rolling back the foreskin; sweet odor in spite of washing.
Heart: Psorinum cures many heart complaints.
Palpitation from the least exertion, better lying. Stitching pain better lying. Cardiac murmurs of either side. Mitral regurgitant murmur. Pericarditis of rheumatic origin. Heart symptoms with general weakness, dusky face, dazed look.
Weak, irregular and rapid pulse. But mark the modalities. Aggravation in the open air, aggravation when sitting up, aggravation when sitting at the writing table; wants to rest the chest and breathing apparatus by lying down. Asthmatic dyspnoea ameliorated by lying down, and worse the nearer the arms are brought to the body. Such symptoms are found in very few remedies and in none so marked as in Psorinum.
Febrile state. Intermittent, bilious fever, fever from a cold. The patient is so hot that the hand under the covers feels as though in a steam bath and the sensation of heat causes one to draw it back.
It is not the dry heat of Belladonna, yet it is as intense. It is a steam. He is covered with a boiling sweat in fevers. Head and body hot and hot air or steam beneath the covers. (Opium has this, but it is in a violent congestion to the head, an apoplectic condition.) In intermit tents he is taken on the street with difficult breathing. He wants to go home; he is weak and exhausted, crawls up stairs on the hands and knees.
The chill is not marked, but the heat is intense and the sweat copious. He is almost in a stupor, befogged, bewildered, cannot answer questions; face red, puffed, mottled.
"Sweat profuse, cold, clammy from least exertion."
This is another form which comes on in the weak, broken down state. After typhoids, he sweats if he turns in bed, after the least exertion, and the sweat is cold. Profuse night sweats. Night sweats of phthisis; when there is that tremendous heat under the covers, a copious hot sweat; mental state as if dazed.
Marasmus; shriveling of the skin; dirty skin; cannot wash it clean. Offensive discharge from the bowels; great emaciation; increased growth of hair on the face; a fuzz (Nat-mur., Psor., Sulph Calc.); horribly offensive in spite of washing; ravenous appetite yet grows thin. Foetid odors would lead one to think of Psorinum.
by James Tyler Kent