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| Magic of Homoepathic Tinctures of Herbs in Breast Tumour |
| R. Harris |
| Honorary Adviser, Homeopathic Medical Association of Canada |
| *Corresponding author: |
Dr. R Harris, MDH, DAc, CMD
Homeopathic Medical
Association of Canada
24B-279 Weber St. N, Canada
Tel: 519-342-9606
E-mail: dr.ronharris@yahoo.ca or x_homeopath@yahoo.ca |
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| Received September 26, 2011; Accepted October 17, 2011; Published October
19, 2011 |
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| Citation: Harris R (2011) Magic of Homoepathic Tinctures of Herbs in Breast
Tumour. J Cancer Sci Ther 3: 189-194. doi:10.4172/1948-5956.1000086 |
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| Copyright: © 2011 Harris R. This is an open-access article distributed under the
terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted
use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and
source are credited. |
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| According to researchers in the medical field of cancer, the origin
of cancer is often related to a pathogenic form of fungus - Mucor
racemosus fresen and other fungi. These forms can develop when
carcinogenic 'hits' are allowed to create a suitable environment in the
body fluids that foster development. This, along with various other
factors provides the required internal environment for the microbes to
flourish within the cells and upset normal replication process. |
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| Other researchers in this field maintain that the basis of cancer
rests upon the "An artatic basic law", which states that the protit, a
protein molecule found naturally within the blood cells and tissues
of all warm-blooded mammals, can progress to its most supplicated,
pathogenic form- Mucor bacterial or fungal stage - if it is given the
proper environment. |
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| In 1974 a blood parasite called Siphonospora polymorpha - a
form of Mucor racemosus freshen was identified as an agent in the
development of cancer. The rods of this parasite infest the healthy
body cells and cause uncontrolled division and malignant growth.
Thus cancer can be recognized in its earlier stage by measurement of
pH values of blood and microscopic examination of visible rods by
staining. |
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| It should be noted that cancer is not hereditary, however, offsprings
can inherit genetic predisposition in the form of weak areas in the body
that can easily be subjected to these rods. As a result, certain types of
cancer, such a breast cancer, tend to be common to a particular family. |
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| Let me take this opportunity to make a few cursory yet practical
remarks on the cause of mammary tumors in women. I say this, not
that men do not get breast tumours, but that it is more common and
serious amongst women. To begin with, next to the uterus the breasts
are most frequently attacked by cancer. Tumours in the female breasts
are very rarely primary to the breasts, but are most commonly produced
in the breast much in the same way that organ enabled it to perform its
natural function in suckling the human off spring. By this I mean the
part is rendered physiologically active from the utero-ovarian sphere.
Whether this view of the origin of mammary tumours has ever been
considered before, I do not know, in any case, I have it from my own
observations in practical life. |
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| Cancer of breast most commonly occurs between the ages of 40
and 50, the period generally regarded as a change of life. Unmarried
females and those who had no children seem to be more liable to it,
than married women with children. Before and after this period, it is
proportionally a rare occurrence. |
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| The most frequently observed form of carcinoma of mama is
scirrhus, next to which we range the medullary fungus, the alveolar or
colloid - a variety of the epithelial cancer. |
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| Usually there is some disease or irritation or change in the lower
part of the body, either arising primarily there or else expressed their
holopathically. I will not enter into details of these causes here, as the
subject is too large and too complex for my present purpose, which
will be sufficiently served if I say that the usage of mechanical or other
intra - vaginal materials for the purpose of cleanliness or otherwise, or for the cure of mechanical hurts and injuries to the parts, the cautery
[burning of flesh by caustic substance and/or hot iron], genesic frauds
and surrogates, all these may severally result in the formation of
tumours in the ovaries, uterus, or breasts. The point I want to make here
is that mammary tumours do not usually arise from the cause existing
primarily in the breasts themselves, but the cause is usually in some
other more or less remote part of the organism, most frequently in the
ovaries. Or the cause is organism, and the tumour is the mammary
expression of the constitutional condition of the individual. |
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| And even if knock or blow; or contusion or pressure from the
stays is generally regarded as the cause of this disease, it is probably
because no better cause can be found, not that the disease has never
been known to result immediately from such injury. The influence of
emotional depression and stress, which are so commonly succeeded
by cancerous degeneration, is perhaps more evident source of this
disease. However, I believe, there is usually something constitutional
that favours neoplasm; and it is this something which we have failed
to understand, constitutes the danger to the future integrity of the
individual. If I am correct, in what I maintain, with regard to the place
of real primary origin and cause of tumours in the female breasts, then
it must follow that surgery can never be a cure, since it is only the
product that is operatively got rid of, and not the disease itself. Proof
of this is the number of cases, in which the disease has returned in the
other breast or some other part of the body or in the area of the same
breast that had been surgically removed from the body and the number
of times, I myself have seen this recurrence of tumours, after they had
been removed surgically, is so great, that I could adduce an absolutely
overwhelming chain of evidence to prove my contention that the use
of knife simply leads to the transfer of the disease to other organs, but
I forbear; the fact is patent, and is within the experience of all medical
people and, indeed of almost all ladies of experience who take note of
what goes on in their own social circles. |
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| I conclude, therefore, that both theory and experience condemn
the use of knife, which in my humble opinion is no cure for tumours.
You may ask, is an operation, then absolutely and always useless and
damnable? Not quite that, though it is not often needful if the case is
taken early, when the tumour is young and tender. BUT when it has
become large, very large, broken, granulating and auto - infective, then
an operation is called for. But medicinal means should be at once used
to prevent recurrence. In the early stages operation is both damnable
and dangerous. |
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| Let me make it clear, that by tumours I mean all lumps and
swellings whatever, the something being more or less growths on or in
the human body, inclusive of such as are called cancer. |
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| Woman's nature is essentially plastic, formative; woman is the
mother of every man of us. Her formative power becomes perverted
by trauma, vice, or disease. It is apt to localize itself by creating a lump
in the breasts or elsewhere. Of course men get tumours also, but that is
the reason of their being the sons of the women, and possessing some
of their formative powers thus perverted and locally expressed. Let us
look at some cases of cancer, but before I do that let me give you a
simple self-diagnosis of cancer signs. |
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| A = Asymmetrical B = Border, uneven C= colour, various D =
Dimensions,different |
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| Case 1 |
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| At the beginning of year1989, a friend and a patient was consulting
me on account of her health. She was very depressed and frequently
burst into tears because her sisters in Austria had developed cancer
after her dog jumped on her and damaged her right breast. For over a
year she had been going from a physician to a physician and a specialist
to a specialist. It seems there was nothing in the world that will help
her. I invited her sister to see me. She brought along a letter from her
physician in Austria urging immediate surgery. A specialist was in
agreement and went on to say that even a day's delay will be dangerous.
I looked at the letter, it was written over a month a go. I looked at her,
yes! She was breathing and sitting right in front of me more than a
month after she received this letter, telling her that a day's delay in not
undergoing surgery was dangerous. |
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| Examination of right breast as compared to the left breast showed
diminution in the size of the right one. The nipple was deeply retracted.
From a little opening in the nipple region oozed a fluid with foul odour.
The breast was puckered, and one raised ridge on its outer aspect was
inflamed, swollen, and bluish at one part . The breast was hard and so
retracted and held down by bridles of tissue behind it, that it could not
be moved as a whole at all - this was an unmistakable picture of cancer. |
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| I could see this unfortunate souls eyes looking at me, then her
breast, and then reading physician letters urging immediate surgery
and then bursting into flood of tears. |
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| I turned to her and said slowly " Madam, the breast in yours; note
that; not your sisters; not your physicians; not mine, but yours; and if
I were you I would keep it. I promise you nothing, but this I can tell
you, that in my experience, and speaking humanly, homoeopathy can
cure you, though the course of the cure will be slow; for that I find is
almost invariably the case in treatment of tumours, whether malignant
or otherwise (benign), the mending by the help of homoeopathic
remedies is slow. Since she had made up her mind not to undergo
surgery, she agreed to homoeopathic treatment. |
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| On 7th March, the breast being painful, I ordered RX Bellis Per Φ 10
drops 4 times daily in water. |
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| Bellis Perennis, The daisy, is our own lovely indigenous bruisewart,
wound-wart: it acts very much like our own Arnica, even to the
production and cure of boils and erysipelas; it causes pain in the spleen,
general symptoms of Coryza, of feeling very tired and wanting to lie
down. It acts on exudates, swellings (think tumours), stasis, fagged
womb, discomforts of pregnancy and varicose veins, in vertigo and
giddiness of older people, old workmen, labourers and the overworked and fagged. Here we have Dr. Burnett's own particular remedies, of
which, scattered through his telling little monographs, he has so much
to say. He has revived and rendered excellent scientific evidence on the
use of this herb. "Disease of skin have , for most part, their origin, he
states, is not in the skin itself, but essentially citaneous manifestations
of some more or less remote organic wrongs. |
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| Dr.Fletcher mentions its use in aches from cold drinks, wet cold
and acne of the face. |
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| Dr. Jophnann Schroeder's Pharmacopoeia Universalis recommends
daisy for hemorrhage, Dysentery, as herrliches Wund kraut, for the
effects of falls, blows, bruises and the like pains in joints, rheumatism
( hence called Gicht kraut). Nocturnal cramps, angina pectoris, fevers,
inflammation, lameness. German mothers are in the habit of using
it as an aperient - a gentle purgative, cold draught, from drinking
something very cold when the body is in a heated condition and dropsy
from drinking too many cold drinks in dog's day's i.e. hot weather |
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| Dr. Christopher Schorer in his Medicina gives testimony of
having cured two cases of dangerous coughs resulting from drinking
something very cold when the bodies were heated |
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| Dr. Clarke, his friend, admirer, and recorder, says, 'The Daisy is
a flower which is repeatedly trodden upon, and always comes up
smiling; and being the day's eye, may be the sign of its too easy waking
properties.'. He quotes Burnett as saying, 'It acts very much like Arnica,
even to the production of erysipelas." |
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| You can easily compare daisy to Calendula., Hypericum., Conium;
Arsenicum; Hamamallis and vanadium, this means when you are at
loss for one of these herbs, you can go out in the fields and, in its season
- a very long one indeed! - get help from the floweret from which our
childish fingers used to weave daisy chains. You may have to scramble
up the hill for Cheilidonium; or drag your feet out of marshes to get to
Equisetum for urinary difficulties; but while many precious herbs are
difficult to find or recognize, no one can mistake or overlook daisy,
which makes meadows everywhere to smile. |
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| Poets have loved this flower. For Shakespeare, it is "Daises pied"
(variegated like a magpie), while Tennyson makes the unfortunate
lover of 'Maud' sing: |
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| “I know the way she went, |
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| Home with her maiden posy; |
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| For her feet have touched the meadows, |
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| And have left the daisies rosy.” |
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| Culpeper (1616-54) writes of the "Little Common Daisy": The
leaves and sometimes the roots, are used, and are reckoned among the
traumatic and vulnerary plants, being used in wound drinks, and are
accounted good to dissolve congealed and coagulated blood, to help
the pleurisy and peri-pneumonia. In the King's evil the tincture given
internally, and cataplasm of leaves applied externally, are considered
to be extraordinary remedies. This is a herb which nature has made
commonly available to us, because it may be useful. Boiled in Asses
milk, it is very effective in consumption of the lungs. |
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| A word of caution - when given at night Bellis causes patient to
wake up early in the morning and cannot get off again. |
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| On 21st March, Within 2 weeks vast improvement was noticed. I
followed up with RX Arnica Montana 5 drops 3 times daily at a potency
of 1x. |
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| On 28th March after a week the lady was feeling whole lot better. I
repeated Arnica. |
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| On 4th April, a week later she came back complaining of waking
up with nasty taste in the mouth. I repeated Arnica, but added
Chelidonium majus 1x. |
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| On 12th April she returned not feeling well. The skin of diseased
breast was red; very painful; she just had her menses. I returned to
Bellis perennis Φ 5 drops 3 times daily in water. Bellis is known to help
women during the change of life (PMS). |
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| On 19th April, she returned feeling a good deal better. The covering
of skin was less red, and the nipple not quite so much retracted. |
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| On 26th April, after another week went bye, she returned to show
how beautifully her breast was mending. It was softer and the nipple
was less drawn. However a portion of cutaneous covering was still red.
I repeated RX. Bellis perennis. |
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| On 2nd May, much mending had taken place. I repeated Rx. Bellis
perennis. |
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| On 9th May, the mammilla was less retracted, and the breast began
to be slightly movable. She was having menses and was tired. I repeated
Rx. Bellis parennis Φ excellent for fag from menstruation, increasing
dose to 5drops 4 times in water. |
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| On 16th May, improvement continued. |
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| On 23rd May, breast was getting bigger, returning to its previous
natural size and more movable. I asked she take Bellis 5 times daily. |
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| On 30th May, the breast was much less drawn in; the top of the nipple
now sunk only about half an inch from the level; all the discoloration
had gone from the mamma surface; she was getting stouter. I repeated
RX Bellis |
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| On 9th June, I noticed her nose running; ran like water ever since
she was put on Bellis, which is pathogenic. Breast was tenderer; this was
last day of her menses. I continued with Rx. |
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| On 14th June, Some redness around Areola mammilla was evident.
Repeated Rx. |
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| On 28th June, Very bad Coryza , bad cough; green mucous with
some blood. This she said was the worst cold she ever had. Continued
with RX. |
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| On 6th July, Her breast not quite well. She is in menses. Repeat Rx. |
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| On 13th July, She informed me for the first time, that the right
nipple has peeled at times for years, discharging offensive brown liquid.
It is the same state today. repeated RX. |
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| On 20th July, No change. Repeat Rx. |
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| On 30th July, The breast is slowly returning to the normal
appearance, but discharge from the nipple continues. Repeat RX. |
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| On 10th August, Little redness re-appears. I prescribed Sulphur 30x
3x10 daily. |
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| On 27th August, Much improved , but redness continued. I ordered
Belladonna 30x with Sulphur and thereafter returned to Bellis as before. |
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| On 11th September, Mending well; the breast slowly resuming its
former proportions, though still fairly hard. Repeat Bellis. |
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| On 19th September she returned not feeling so well, so I prescribed
Hydrastis Canadensis Φ 3x 5x4. |
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| I may add that I encouraged this lady to request for the original
report on diagnosis, prognosis, and recommendations of surgery, they
refused! And further they denied ever having said positively that it was
cancer; that they only recommended the surgery in case it should be
cancer. |
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| The great pity is that so much time and energy was wasted. The
recovery could have been faster and cheaper. |
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| Let us not go on with these tiring derails; some more remedies were
used, she got better and better and returned to Austria in early 1990. I
have not since seen her; but she phones me regularly every year to tell
me how good she feels and how thankful she is to have met me. Nature
is fierce when she is offended and she is bounteous and kind when she
is obeyed. |
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| Now you can see why I love my DAISY, this herb should be written
up all over all gates and doors for the benefit of the poor harvesters who
in the hot harvest season get ill from partaking Cold drink. She works
so well in cases of cancers of breast. My reasoning may be faulty, but
I think this case shows that my daisy is a notable remedy, a common
weed lying everywhere at our feet and I ask all of you who are here today
to make this known to every one in this world. |
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| Now just a word or two on dietic causes of tumours, and then I am
done and we shall then look at some more cases and some remedies. In
my experience these foods are [1] Too much meat, notably Pork meat
[2] Milk. No doubt many of you will be amazed at my condemning
the use of milk in tumours, particularly tumours of the breast, but I do
so most regretfully, and that from my own personal experience. You
would do well to remember this. |
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| Case 2 |
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| Somewhere around late April or early May, I was having lunch with
a farmer friend of mine, when an elderly man and his wife walked in 38
years old mother with 6 weeks old baby girl at 37 weeks by C-section |
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| Diagnosis: Class 1 cancer of both ovaries. |
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| Right Ovarian Cyst 8.0x5.4 cm. |
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| Left Ovarian Cysts 10.6x8.1 cm & 6.0x4.9 cm. |
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| Hospital Admitted: Early1994. Discharged: After a week. Right
ovary removed, Left ¾ ovary removed due to large cysts. |
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| Suggested Treatment: Chemotherapy, Surgery and radiation
therapy and complete Hysterectomy. |
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| Results expected: 40% success with ½ to 2-year life span. |
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| It turns out that besides all this she had endometriosis adeno
carcinoma and heavy menses related bleeding Cancer wide spread
through out the body. |
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| Suggest |
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| 1. Cassine 1 to 4 cups daily. [Place 1/2 teaspoonful f powder in a
non-metallic cup and fill with boiling water. Water should be distilled
or well filtered or spring or rainwater which is free from heavy minerals. |
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| 2. Vegetable Juice- 1 sip every hour: [3/5 beet juice + 1/5 carrot
juice +1/5 celery Juice +1/5 white or black radish juice. Add salt and
little lemon to taste. Consume 1/4 to 1/2 litre daily. Hold sip in mouth
as long as possible. |
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| 3. Taheebo: 1 cup daily, 1 sip every hour. |
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| Bring 1 litre of water to boiling in a glass container. Add one
tablespoonful of Taheebo bark to the boiling water. Boil rapidly for
5 minutes, simmer for 20 minutes. Allow tea to settle down. Strain
through cheesecloth into a thermos flask. You may drink this tea hot
or cold. Take one cup out of the flask for days use and take small sips.
Keep each sip in mouth as long as possible. |
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| 4. Mixed tea: One sip every hour. [Male and female LANCE leaf
plantain, Iceland moss, Lungwort, Ground Ivy, Common Mullein,
Meum Mutellia]. Take 1/4 teaspoon of each (or most) of these herbs in
powder form and mix them well. Over a pinch of this mixture divided
into equal proportions, pour 4 ounces or 125 m of water. Let stand for
10 minutes and hold sip in mouth as long as possible. |
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| 5. Put bitter almonds in honey and store for a year. Eat three
almonds daily. |
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| 6. Marigold Tea: one sip per day. [Take 1 teaspoonful of marigold
and boil in 1/2 litre of water for 2 minutes. |
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| 7. Sage Tea: 1 sip every hour [Boil one table spoonful garden sage
leaves in 1/2 litre of water for 3 minutes. remove from heat source, add
pinch of St.John's Wort, Peppermint leaves and Balm leaves. Cover and
let sit for 10 minutes. Hold sip in mouth as along as possible. |
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| 8. Thuya Occidental + Hypericum perf. 5M 15x3. |
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| 9. All to be spaced 15 to 30 minutes. |
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| 10. No meat/sugars/fats/low consumption of diary products. All
vegetables should be organic and fresh. All above remedies MUST be
prepared fresh daily. |
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| 11. Do not breast feed your baby. |
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| 12. Avoid work, stress, cosmetics and chemicals. |
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| This person has fully recovred and has 3 children, excluding one
aborted at an earlier date. The oldest child is now 7 years old and
attending school. I meet the family regularly and we often discuss the
days when she used to get regular calls from cancer hospital, asking if
she was still living and how she used to brake out in tears and cry to tell
them, yes! I am living, can't you hear me. However, they always asked
that they would like her to undergo test to show that she was still living. |
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| Some of the homoepathic remedies providing good results
are as follows |
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| Asterias Rubens [Red Starfish] 6-30: |
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| Ulcerated cancer of mamma |
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| Lancinating pain or pain in one breast |
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| Pain putted inward |
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| Pain extending to arm up to little finger |
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| Left Axillary gland swollen |
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| Left Axillary gland hard |
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| Left Axillary gland knotted |
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| Pain less at night |
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| Badiaga [Fresh water sponge] 6-30: |
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| Skin sore to touch |
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| Axilla glands enlarged |
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| Sensitive to cold and touch |
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| Bellis Perennis [Daisy] 3: |
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| Malignant tumours of the jaw - Φ 5 drops in water, morning and
night for 2 months |
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| Right half of the face between eye, mouth and beard swollen with
glistening shinny skin over it |
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| Malignant tumours of the right breast, which is swollen - 3x 3drops
in water 4 times daily |
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| Mammary tumours |
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| Buffo [Poison of the Toad] 30 |
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| Palliative in cancer of mamma – indurations |
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| Burning congestive headache. On vertex |
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| Feeling of weight |
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| Carbo. Animalis [Animal Charcol] 30: |
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| Indurated borders |
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| Ulcerated cancer |
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| Fistulous openings |
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| Stinging |
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| Burning |
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| Lancinating pain |
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| Specifically sensitive to cold |
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| Castor Equi [Rudimentary Thumb nail of the Horse]: |
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| Nipples ulcerated |
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| Nipples cracked |
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| Conium [Poison hemlock] 30-1000: |
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| Extensively used for malignant affections of the glands |
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| Hard tumours in mamma |
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| Piercing pain |
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| Pain greater at night |
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| Mamma shriveled |
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| Sexual desire increased |
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| Croton Tiglium [Croton-oil seed] 200: |
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| Removes pain of left breast |
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| Feeling of pain going from left chest to back |
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| Feeling of pain going from left nipple to back |
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| Cundurango [Condor Plant]: |
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| Sign: Tumours of left breast with crack in the left angle of the mouth |
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| Produces cracks in the angle of the mouth and also cures such, |
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| Is an antiphonic |
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| Seems to cure cancers |
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| Graphite [Black lead, Plumbago] 30: |
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| Swelling |
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| Indurations |
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| Nipple – cracked |
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| constipation |
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| Ulcerated cancer |
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| Sticky discharge |
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| Nipple has cracks and crust |
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| Hydrastis Can. [Golden seal] Φ - 30: |
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| Used by American Indians as a remedy for cancer |
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| Pre-cancerous condition |
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| Constipation |
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| Digestion – poor |
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| Muscles – weak |
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| External application as an ointment or a solution of the resinod
Hydrastin |
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| Mercurius Solubilis 6: |
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| mamma in suppurative stage |
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| yellowish/greenish discharge |
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| stinging pain |
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| Enlarged axilla gland |
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| Phytolocca [Poke Root]: |
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| In C.M potency - single dose tends to disperse malignant and nonmalignant
tumours |
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| Ulcerated cancer of fistulous type |
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| Discharge – watery, fetid |
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| Skin – purplish |
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| Mamma – hard and sensitive |
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| Nipple - ulcerated (also consider Aur.iod., Castor., Cond.,Con.,
Graph., hep., Nit.ac., Paeoma., Phell., Phyto., Ratan., sep., Sil., Cham.,
petr.) |
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| Plumbum Iodatum: |
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| Indurations of mammary glands |
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| Glands inflamed |
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| Glands sore |
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| Glands painful |
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| Atrophy |
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| Silicea [Silica; Pure Flint] 200 – CM: |
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| Given in time will abort abscess of breast |
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| Fistulous ulcer of breasts |
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| Watery discharge (for discharge of blood between menses consider Sil., Phos.) (for discharge of blood from vagina when child is nursed,
consider Sil.) |
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| Discharge is offensive |
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| Thuja Occidentalis [Arbour vitae]: |
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| Acts on skin and blood. Its relation to the produces of pathological
vegetation condylomate, warty swellings, spongy tumours, moist
mucous tubercles, and bleeding fungal growths is very important |
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| Tumours of right breast and right arm |
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| Note: Here are some of the additional remedies I have used with
good results - Urkalk gneiss, Grauvogl,s Lapis alb, Sulphur, Psorium. |
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| Sources |
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| Kent., Allen., Baher; Boger; Boenninghausen; Tyler; Dunham;
Voison; Harris; Hughes" Pharmacodynamics; British Journal of
Homoeopathy; Homoeopathic World; Journals of the Canadian
Institute of Homoeopathic Medicine; Homoeopathic review;
Homoeopathic Heritage |
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| Conium malculatum |
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| Commonly called spotted hemlock, umbelliferae is a native of
Europe, but is naturalized in the United States of America. |
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| Hahnemann published two provings of Conium. One in 'Materia
Medica Pura' and the other in 'Chronic Diseases'. |
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| After describing its homeopathic preparation, he states 'The great
medicinal powers of this plant may be inferred from what has been
written by Stoerk and his followers on the brilliant results obtained by
means of Conium in the years 1770, 1771, etc |
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| The active principle is conia, a yellowish oily looking transparent
fluid, lighter than water, of an acrid, nauseous, tobacco like taste. It
smells like tobacco and mice. It is very volatile, slightly soluble in water,
less so in warm water than in cold water, readily soluble in alcohol,
ether and oil. It is alkaline. Its combination with acids does not easily
crystallize, and are very soluble and poisonous. |
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| Conium that grows in southern latitudes is thought to be more
powerful than that which grows in northern climates. It should not
be subjected to heat, because the active principle is volatile; hence the
extract is the juice, succus conii; and this is almost identical with the
homoeopathic tincture. |
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| It is remarkable that while this substance, or its active principle, is
one of the most active and rapid poisons, yet some animals, as the goat,
sheep and horse, eat the plant with impurity. |
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| The ancients recommended conium as an anodyne for pains, and
as useful erysipelas and in phagdenic ulcers. Dioscorides recommended
the application of crushed plant upon genitals to remedy nocturnal
pollution, and upon the breasts of girls to prevent their development. |
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| Pliny and Avicenna recommended polices have Conium and corn
plaster to remove tumours of the breasts and testes, and to repress the
secretion of milk. |
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| Let us then see how conium acts? |
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| Gradual paralysis of the voluntary muscles seems to be the effect of
Conium; first the lower, then the upper extremities, then the muscles of
the trunk, and finally those of respiration. |
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| Let us understand how this paralysis is produced? |
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| It may be by affection of the muscles themselves, or of the brain
and the cord, the centres of action, or of the nerves, the conveyors of
stimulus to act. |
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| The question therefore arises is, is it due to changes produced in
muscles by Conium? |
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| One would say, probably not, because muscles taken from an
animal completely paralyzed by conium act energetically under
galvanic current, and do not act when the current is passed through
the nerves supplying the muscles; but only when the current is passed
through the muscular substance itself. |
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| It cannot be that the spinal cord is affected, because if the artery
and vein of one limb be ligatured, and the animal then paralyzed by
Conium, the limb thus protected is moved energetically, as in health.
Neither can its action be on the brain, because in this case the poisoned
blood passed as freely to the brain as to the cord; nor was intelligence
impaired. It must, then affect the motor and the periphery sooner than the trunk of the nerve. Conium causes gradual paralysis , first the lower,
then the upper extremities, then the muscles of the trunk, and finally
those of respiration. |
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| Dr. John Hartley of London, England on his published work
containing proving upon the healthy subject, of Conium and some
other drugs states: The first effect of Conium is a depression of the
motor function; and its last effect is the complete obliteration of all
muscular motion derived from the cerebo-spinal-motor tract. It exerts
its power chiefly, if not exclusively, upon the motor nerves within
cranium; and of these the corpora striata are the parts chiefly affected.
The sensory part of the nervous system is not affected. Considering this
physiological action of Conium he regards it as a palliative in cancer, in
that it allays muscular spasm, and thus mitigates pain. |
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| Conium is recommended in convulsions, chorea, muscular
tumors, pertussis, spasms of esophagus and stomach, spasms of
glottis, paraplegia, concussions, opthalmia, orbucularis and corrugator
supercilli. |
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