Apocynaceae group of Homeopathy remedies

The order APOCYNACEAE includes a number of plants which offers us many varieties of medicinal substances. The members of the family are usually trees or erect shrubs, rarely herbs. All these plants are highly attractive & have ornamental value either because of the beautiful flowers or sweet scented fluid which they secrete. Same time highly toxic anor deadly poisons.

They are evergreen, perennial plants growing in moist grounds or along the river banks. They have cathartic properties, the roots emetic and the barks bitter and astringent.in ancient times used as arrow poison(strophanthus) because of muscle toxicity. The plants of this order are very poisonous. They depress the nervous system causing prostration, narcosis and paralysis. The flowers and leaves may even cause death inweakeranimals.

Medicines belonging to apocynaceae
1. Apocynum cannabinum
2. Apocynum androsaemifolium
3. Alstonia constricta
4. Alstonia scholaris
5. Aspidosperma quebracho
6. Carissa schimperi
7. Cymarinum
8. Echites suberecta
9. Holarrhena anti dysentrica
10. Oleander
11. Quabinum
12. Rauwolfia serpentina
13. Strophanthus hispidus
14. Strophanthus sarmentosus
15. Tanghinia
16. Thevetia
17. Toxicophlea thumbergi
18. Vinca minor

Alkaloids
1. Aspidosperminum
2. Ditain
3. Reserpine
4. Strophanthinum

COMMON CHARACTERISTICS

Mind

• There is no sufficient data regarding mental features. Unconventional way we can explain as following
• Vinca found wild in Europe & India , being a dwarf shrug it propagate in all directions and cover a wide area in soil depriving other weaker plants of light &air
• Witches & sorcers used it for making love between man & wife if used in their meals
• According to’ flower essence repertory’ vinca is used for promiscuous, self centred people neglecting love & responsibility in sex , brutal & insensitive towards opposite sex after being used
• All these plants are highly attractive & have ornamental value either because of the beautiful flowers or sweet scented fluid which they secrete. Same time highly toxic anor deadly poisons
• All of them have ravenous appetite, & desire for stimulants like tea, coffee, alcohol, tobacco etc
• Emotions are not specific,. Increased excitement and exaltation of fancies,irritability, restlessness, anxiety verging into insanity, all sorts of alternating states.
• These plants are half parasites- partly depend on others for nutrition(stroph, vinca)
• Remedies of apocynaceae fmly exhibit wild, animalic, or instinctual , self centered attitude where ones own needs and pleasures are met with irrespective of any concern for the surrounding or others

Physical features
1) Dropsical affections– Renal and Cardiac dropsy, Anasarca,       Dropsy of serous membranes. Increases the flow of urine.

• Apocynum cannabinum
• Apocynum androsae mifolium
• Strophanthus
• Aspidosperma

2) Action on heart– Cardiac dropsy, Fatty degeneration, Arteriosclerosis, Hypertension, Cardiac asthma, Myocardial debility. Cardiac Depressant.increases the contractility of the heart and decreases the rate through vagi like digoxin like action of its active principle

Strophanthus
Rauwolfia
Aspidosperma
Apocynum cannabinum

3) Action on mucus membrane of git-Producing diarrhoea and vomiting immediately after eating or drinking.. Stools copious , watery , discharged with an expulsive force, escapes while passing flatus, paralysis of sphincter ani. Empty all gone sensation in stomach.Digestive disturbance as a concomitant to each & every complaint is a hallmark of this group
Alstonia scholaris
Alstonia constricta
Holarrhena anti dysentrica
Tanghinia
Thevetia
Oleander
Apocynum cannabinum

4) Actions on central nervous system– Depressing and sedative action. Weakness of memory, slowness of perception, trembling externally, weakness and debility.
Apocynum
Oleander
Rauwolfia
Alstonia constricta
Alstonia scholaris
Tanghinia

5) Action on skin– Violent itching eruptions, bleeding and oozing especially of the scalp, behind ears and on face, Crusta lactea. Oozing hardens in to a crust beneath which Vermins breed.
Vinca minor
Oleander

6) Ill effects of alcohol or stimulant abuse

7) Discharges are either scanty, or involuntary or profuse 

Important remedies

APOCYNUM CANNABINUM–Indian Hemp.

• Excretions diminished, especially urine and sweat.
• Dropsy of serous membranes; acute, inflammatory. Dropsy : with thirst (Acet. ac.), water disagrees or is vomited (Ars.); most cases uncomplicated with organic diseases; after typhus, typhoid, scarlatina, cirrhosis; after abuse of quinine.
• Acute hydrocephalus, with open sutures; stupor, sight of one eye lost; constant and voluntary motion of one arm and one leg (left arm and leg, Bry.); forehead projected.
• Amenorrhoea in young girls, with bloating or dropsical extension of abdomen and extremities.
• Metrorrhagia : continued or paroxysmal flow; fluid or clotted; nausea, vomiting, palpitation; pulse quick, feeble, when moved; vital depression, fainting, when raising head from pillow.
• Cough, short and dry, or deep and loose, during pregnancy (Con.).
• Relations. Similar : to, Acetic acid, Apis (no thirst), Ars., Cinch., Dig., in dropsical affections.
• Blatta orientalis has cured bad cases of general dropsy, after Apis, Apoc. and Dig. failed.-Haynes. 

ALSTONIA SCHOLARIS (dita bark)

• Malarial diseases, with diarrhoea, dysentery, anaemia, feeble digestion, are the general conditions suggesting this remedy.
• Characteristics are the gone sensation in stomach and sinking in abdomen, with debility.
• A tonic after exhausting fevers.
• Abdomen
•  – Violent purging and cramp in bowels.
•  – Heat and irritation in lower bowels.
•  – Camp diarrhoea, bloody stool, dysentery; diarrhoea from bad water and malaria.
•  – Painless watery stools. [Phosph. ac.] Diarrhoea immediately after eating.
• Locally, for ulcers and rheumatic pains. 

ASPIDOSPERMA QUEBRACHO (quebracho)

• The digitalis of the lungs. (Hale.)
• Removes temporary obstruction to the oxidation of the blood by stimulating respiratory centres, increasing oxidation and excretion of carbonic acid.
• Pulmonary stenosis.
• Thrombosis of pulmonary artery.
• Uraemic dyspnoea.
• An effective remedy in many cases of asthma.
• It stimulates the respiratory centers and increases the oxygen in the blood.
• “Want of breath” during exertion is the guiding symptom.
• Cardiac asthma.
• Relationship
• Compare : Coca; Arsenic; Coffea – Catalpa (difficult respiration). 

OLEANDER  (rose-laurel)

• Has a marked action on the skin, heart and nervous system, producing and curing paralytic conditions with cramp-like contractions of upper extremities.
• Hemiplegia.
• Difficult articulation.
• Head
• Vertigo; agg. looking fixedly at an object or looking down, turning to either side in bed; with diplopia.
• Headache amel. by looking crossways, sideways or squinting.
• Vertigo for a long time before paralysis.
• Eruption on scalp.
• Humid, fetid spots behind ears [Graph.; Petrol.] and occiput, with red, rough, herpetic spots in front.
• Corrosive itching on forehead and edge of hair; worse, heat. Biting, itching of scalp.
• Moist milk crusts, agg. occiput.
• Can see objects only when looking at them sideways.
• Eyes water on reading. Double vision.
• Sensation as if eyes were drawn back into the head. 

Stomach & abdomen

• Canine hunger, with hurried eating, without appetite.
• Borborygmus, with profuse, fetid flatus.
• Gnawing around navel.
• Ineffectual urging.
• Undigested faeces. Stool passes when emitting flatus.
• Burning pain in anus. 

Extremities

• Weakness of lower limbs.
• Paralysis of legs and feet.
• Want of animal heat in limbs.
• Cold feet.

Painless paralysis.

• Constant cold feet.
• Swelling, burning stiffness of fingers.
• Veins and hands swollen.
• Oedema.
• Stiffness of joints.

Skin

• Itching, scurfy pimples; herpes; sensitive and numb.
• Nocturnal burning.
• Very sensitive skin; slightest friction causes soreness and chapping.
• Violent itching eruption, bleeding, oozing; want of perspiration.
• < undressing, rest, friction of clothes
• Pruritus, especially of scalp, which is sensitive 

RAUWOLFIA SERPENTINE– sarpagandhi

• A very old drug in Hindu medicine, the roots and rhizomes contain hypotensive and neurodepressive alkaloids. Mainly reserpine

Clinical
High blood pressure; irritative condition of central nervous system; insanity; violent maniacal symptoms. Fever during puerperium. In high blood-pressure without marked atheromatous changes in the vessels. It is also acts as a sedative.

Generalities

• Dystonia of the nerves and circulatory system .
• Pallor, alternating with redness and hot flushes.
• Heaviness in the legs.
• General stiffness.
• Chronic allergic and mesenchymatic condition, with development of arthrosis or neurotic epression.
• The types are often carbo-phosphoric, with nervous or sanguine temperament.

Mind

• Diminution of the memory and powers of concentration.
• Inner uneasiness, with irritability and apprehension.
• Alternating excitability and depression .
• Phases of increased ability to work, and wellbeing, alternating with phases of fatigue and exhaustion.
• Face expressionless , and he avoids any effort .
• Nervous system
• Congestive headache,  with arterial palpitations in the temples and forehead.
• Frontal headache , spreading towards the occiput, ameliorated in fresh air, accompanied by hot flushes, dizziness, general stiffness and pain in all the limbs.
• Congestion of the face , and possible epistaxis.
• Excessive salivation.
• Rapid, widespread trembling.
• Slow in going to sleep, and stays awake for hours aftermidnight.
• Erotic dreams.
• Neuralgia of the upper maxilla, ameliorated by heat.
• Hypoaesthesic sensation in the right half of the face, followed by shooting pains. 

Circulatory system

• Palpitations, prickling and irregular heart beat.
• Dyspnoea from exertion, with lack of air.
• Vertigo and precordial heaviness, cramping pains spreading towards the neck, discomforts, tendency to faintness, with sticky sweating from the hands and feet.
• Amelioration from movement in the open air.
• Temporary rise , and then fall , in arterial tension .
• Palpitations and irregularity of the heart when lying down, ameliorated by standing and by walking.
• Hypotonia, with diarrhoea.
• Sensation of heat on the whole body, with or without sweating, and accompanied by congestive headache and general uneasiness.

STROPHANTHUS HISPIDUS (kombe-seed)

• Strophanthus is a muscle poison; it increases the contractile power of all striped muscles.
• Acts on the heart; increasing the systole and diminishes the rapidity.
• May be used with advantage to tone the heart, and run off dropsical accumulations.
• In small doses for weak heart; it feels enlarged.
• In mitral regurgitation, where oedema and dropsy have supervened. [Digit.]
• Strophanthus occasions no gastric distress, has no cumulative effects, is a greater diuretic, and is safer for the aged, as it does not affect the vaso-motors.
• In pneumonia and in severe prostration from haemorrhage after operations and acute diseases.
• After the long use of stimulants; irritable heart of tobacco-smokers.
• Arterio-sclerosis; rigid arteries of aged.
• Restores tone to a brittle tissue, especially of the heart muscle and valves.
• Especially useful in failing compensation dependent upon fatty heart.
• Hives.
• Anaemia with palpitation and breathlessness.
• Exophthalmia goitre.
• Corpulent persons.

Respiratory

• Dyspnoea, especially on ascending.
• Lungs congested.
• Oedema of lungs.
• Bronchial and cardiac asthma.

Heart

• Pulse quickened.
• Heart’s action weak, rapid irregular, due to muscular debility; and insufficiency.
• Cardiac pain.

Skin

• Urticaria, especially more chronic forms.

Relationship

• Compare : Digit. (but is slower than strophant. in its action)
• Phos. ac. (weak heart, irregular pulse, fluttering sensation in cardiac region, palpitation during sleep, fainting). 

VINCA MINOR  (lesser periwinkle)

• A remedy for skin affections, eczema, and especially plica polonica; also for haemorrhages and diphtheria.
• Head – Tearing pain in vertex, ringing and whistling in ears.
• Whirling vertigo, with flickering before eyes.
• Spots on scalp, oozing moisture, matting hair together. Corrosive itching of scalp.
• Bald spots.
• Plica polonica.
• Irresistible desire to scratch.
• Nose – Tip gets red easily.
• Moist eruption on septum.
• Stoppage of one nostril.
• Sores in nose.
• Seborrhoea upper lip and base of nose.
• Throat – Diphtheria.
• Female – Excessive menstruation with great weakness.
• Passive uterine haemorrhages. [Ust.; Trill.; Secale.] Menorrhagia; continuous flow, particularly at climacteric. [Lach.]
• Haemorrhages from fibroids.
• Skin – Corrosive itching.
• Great sensitiveness of skin, with redness and soreness from slight rubbing.
• Eczema of head and face; pustules, itching, burning, and offensive odor.
• Hair matted together.
• Relationship Compare: Oleand.; Staph.