Tela araneæ, 349 Thallium, 353 Thlaspi bursa pastoris, 354 Thyroid, 362 Trychosanthes dioica, 364 Tuberculinum, 41
COMMON NAME, Indian Acalypha, Indian Nettle.
PREPARATION.--The fresh plant is macerated with two parts by weight of alcohol.
(Dr. Tonnère, of Calcutta, India, seems to have been the first to call attention to this plant as a remedy. In a small work, _Additions to the Homoeopathic Materia Medica_, collected and arranged by Henry Thomas, M. D., and published in London in the year 1858, appears the following credited to that physician.)
Tincture of the _Acalypha Indica_, prepared and administered in the sixth decimal dilution, is specific in hæmorrhage from the lungs. In three cases in which I have employed it, the persons were affected with phthisis. In one case there was a tuberculous affection of the upper portion of the left lung, of some two years' standing. Hæmoptysis had been going on for three months; the expectoration had been in the morning pure blood; in the evening dark lumps of clotted blood, and the fits of coughing were very violent at night. In this case all homoeopathic remedies had been tried unsuccessfully, when I accidentally discovered the virtues of the _Acalypha Indica_, that remedy having been given me by a native for jaundice. I prepared the mother tincture upon the homoeopathic principle, and took 10 drops, which brought on a severe fit of dry cough, followed by spitting of blood. Having noted all the symptoms experienced by myself, and finding that they were nearly all similar to those of my patients, I gave six drops 6th [decimal] dilution in half a tumbler of water, a spoonful to be taken every half hour, beginning immediately (9 A.M.). At 6 P.M., the blood stopped. I continued this for eight days, and the blood has never reappeared (now three months since). The patient is improving, and auscultation proves the disease has decreased, and I am in hopes to affect a cure, yet one month since I have been giving them the medicine they have not spit any blood, although previously one of them never passed a day without spitting a great quantity. _Calcarea carb._ is an antidote to the _Acalypha_.
Another transatlantic medical friend writes:--"I hope you obtained some of the _Acalypha Indica_ while you were here. I have found it perfectly successful in arresting hæmoptysis in three cases of consumption in the last stage; I could not perceive any other effect from its use, but the cessation of the hemorrhagic sputa was, I think, a great advantage."
