Materia Medica de A a Z

AESCULUS HIPPOCASTANUM (Aesc)

"I do not propose to adopt the usual way by beginning with /Aconite/ and ending with /Zincum/, but to follow the bent of my inclinations, or, as it is sometimes expressed, the movings of the spirit; and may I not here invoke the aid of the spirits of the immortal Hahnemann, Boenninghausen and the galaxy of bright names that adorn the fair page of the history of Homoeopathy to help me."

First: NUX VOMICA (nux-v)

Previus: CONIUM MACULATUM (Conium)

Next: ZINCUM METALLICUM (Zinc)

Sense of fullness and pulsation in various organs and veins (especially plethoric), as if too full of blood.

Constant dull backache across sacrum and hips; agg. walking or on stooping (piles, leucorrhoea, displacements, etc.).

Sense of fullness, and as of sticks in the rectum (haemorrhoids).

Mucous membranes of mouth, throat, rectum are swollen, burn, dry and raw.

Coryza; thin, watery, burning; rawness and sensitive to inhaled cold air.

Frequent inclination to swallow, with burning, pricking, stinging and dry constricted fauces (Apis, Bell).

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This is one of the remedies that is not so remarkable for its wide range of action as it is for positiveness within its range. Almost all its usefulness, so far as known, centres in its action in the lower back and pelvic region and ever prominent is this characteristic: Constant dull backache, affecting sacrum and hips, much aggravated by walking or stooping. It is one of our leading remedies for haemorrhoids, and in addition to this backache there is a feeling of fullness, dryness, and sticking as if the rectum was full of sticks. There is not the tendency to protrusion or prolapsus that there is in Ignatia (Ign), Aloe, Podophyllum (Podo) and some other remedies, and the backache is often greatly out of proportion to any external evidence of piles. This feeling of fullness seems to be a sort of general characteristic of Aesculus, but is especially prominent in the pelvic cavity.

These symptoms are often found in conjunction with other affections besides haemorrhoids, such as uterine displacements, and inflammations; and some very bad forms of leucorrhoea have been promptly cured by this remedy. There is another quite valuable symptom in these pelvic troubles, viz.: throbbing or beating sensations, that calls for Aesculus. I have seen equally good results from the use of this remedy in the 3d, and the potencies.

I used Aesculus with great results in coryza and sore throat. The coryza is very much like the Arsenic (Ars) coryza, thin, watery, and burning, but what characterizes Aesculus here is sensation of rawness: sensitive to inhaled cold air. In the throat it has the same sensation of rawness, both in the acute form, and also in chronic follicular pharyngitis, for which it is often a good remedy. It may be that age and use will develop more uses for this remedy.