By Agostino Mattoli
Y.D., born March 22d, 1996, was, at time of birth, a very healthy child, weighing four Kg. (8 ¼ Ibs.), and he developed normally until early in August, 1906, when, as a result of the change from mother’s milk to artificial diet, necessitated by his mother’s illness, he began to fail.
A regular school specialist was called, who made the diagnosis of ileo-colitis, and began his treatment with calomel, followed by castor oil, etc.
During the ensuing winter the child seemed pretty well, though every now and then he had an intestinal attack. In the spring of 1907 the child failed to gain, looked very delicate and the intestines were almost all the time out of order. Then the specialist ordered that the little patient be taken to a summer resort, instructing the parents to continue his treatment there. But even the country air and all possible care from the mother (a very was sickly all summer.
In December, 1907, the parents, back in Rome, and being very much afraid of losing their child, resolved to try Homoeopathy, and they sent for me.
I examined him December 1st, 1907, and found the little patient, then one year, eight and a half months old, weighing 10 Kg. (20 ½ Ibs.), and looking very badly. The face, cheeks and lips, were pale, the head seemed too large, the abdomen tympanitic, the tongue coated. He was unable to digest, as the mother said, even a tablespoonful of milk. He was irritable all the time, weak, never wanted to play; sometimes he was constipated and sometimes had diarrhoea. Most of the food being undigested.
Considering the symptoms and the fact of the frequent allopathic doses the child had taken, I prescribed Nux vom. 3x for six days, morning and night, and carefully arranged, suitable diet, the principal part being a quart of milk in every twenty-four hours. The mother was very skeptical about its being possible for the child to digest milk, as he never had been able to.
After six days, the report was, good improvement, the child digested his milk and took it with pleasure.
Nux vom. 6x, one dose in the evening only, and Sac. Lac., was the new prescription for the next six days.
Child reported to be still better, but had still, sometimes, constipation, and sometimes diarrhoea, especially in the morning, followed by weakness and dislike of water.
Sulphur 200th, was prescribed, a dose every other day, for six days, and Sac. Lac.
January 1, 1908. – Patient generally better, weight, 11 Kg. (22 ½ Ibs.) slept very well, was round-faced and red cheeked, was always happy, and played boisterously all the time.
The mother said, “His appetite is wonderful, he wants to eat all the time, and the assimilation of his food is almost perfect: he has a little trouble with teething, at present, and is rather thirsty, and two or three times has had diarrhoea, rather green and slimy.”
I gave Calc. Phosph. 3x, one dose a day, for seven days. Child reported much better and having no more trouble with his bowels. Prescribed Calc. phosph. 6x a dose every other day, and Sac. Lac.
May 16. – Child well, gained 400 grammes more since his last weight, in spite of his being in Rome in hot weather. No medicine. He is now two years, two months old, has been six months only, under homoeopathic treatment, is well, happey, and weighs Kg., 12.600 (25 ¾ Ibs.)
What is there to say in connection with this case? It certainly shows the wonderful action of the indicated remedy and the case with which our school can cure cases called chronic and hopeless by our regular school friends, who, with their strong doses, while trying to help their patients, do them much harm, and often when they do get well, it happens, not as a result of their having followed nature in her grand and immutable laws, but absolutely “Contra Medicum!”
Great allopaths still advise their pupils about, at least, not harming any of their patients, and Hyett, in the preface of his book on anatomy, writes, “There are very few drugs that are really useful in practice, and those can be written on a finger nail, but what I recommend is not to do any harm to the patients, and this many doctors never learn during all their lifetime!”
Holt, in his book, “Diseases of Infancy and childhood,” on page 359, speaking of the treatment of chronic ileo-colitis, writes “Little or nothing is to be expected from drugs; no greater mistake is made than to give these children, week after weeks, the various diarrhoea mixtures, with the expectation that ultimately the formula which exactly meets the wants of the particular case will be found. Drugs are to be used only for the relief of special symptoms!”
And being so, why, instead of trying the palliative treatment (that is always harmful), do not our dear colleagues consult with us over these cases when they have seen that we are able, by our system of therapeutics, “similia similibus curantur,” to cure these patients – fighting always the cause of the disease.
