Abies nigra
Picea mariana · Pine resin,Resina piceae,Picea mariana · Plant · Pinaceae
Low-spirited, nervous people who are unable to concentrate or settle are best suited to Abies nig. They are lethargic and dull by day, yet cannot sleep at night. Abies nig. is mainly associated with a sense of “blockage.” It is often used for indigestion with a knotted sensation, as if an egg or stone is lodged in the stomach. The stomach pain always develops after eating and, in an attempt to relieve the discomfort, there may be frequent belching, possibly with constipation, foul-smelling breath, and mild fever with alternating chills and fever. Tea and tobacco are often causative factors behind the Abies nig. symptom picture.
Key symptoms
- Sensation as if a hard-boiled egg lodged at cardiac end of stomach
- Pain in stomach always comes on after eating
- Continual distressing constriction just above pit of stomach, as if knotted up
- Total loss of appetite in morning; great craving at noon and night
- Wakeful and restless at night with hunger
- Dyspepsia in aged persons with functional heart symptoms
- Dyspepsia from abuse of tea or tobacco
- Heart action heavy and slow; sharp cutting pains in heart
- Sensation of something lodged in chest needing to be coughed up
- Low-spirited, unable to think or study
Worse (aggravation)
Better (amelioration)
Black Spruce
A powerful and long-acting remedy, in various forms of disease, whenever the characteristic stomach symptoms are present. Most of the symptoms are associated with the gastric disturbances. In dyspeptic troubles of the aged, with functional heart symptoms; also after tea or tobacco. Constipation. Pain in external meatus.
Head
Hot, with flushed cheeks. Low-spirited. Dull during the day, wakeful at night. Unable to think.
Stomach
Pain in stomach always comes on after eating. Sensation of a lump that hurts, as if a hard-boiled egg had lodged in cardiac end of stomach; continual distressing constriction just above the pit of the stomach, as if everything were knotted up. Total loss of appetite in morning, but great craving for food at noon and night. Offensive breath. Eructations.
Chest
Painful sensation, as if something were lodged in the chest and had to be coughed up; lungs feel compressed. Cannot be fully expanded. Worse coughing; waterbrash succeeds cough. Choking sensation in throat. Dyspnœa; worse lying down; sharp, cutting pain in heart; heart's action heavy and slow; tachycardia, bradycardia.
Back
Pain in small of back. Rheumatic pains and aching in bones.
Sleep
Wakeful and restless at night, with hunger. Bad dreams.
Fever
Alternate heat and cold; chronic intermittent fever, with pain in stomach.
Modalities
Worse after eating.
Relationship
Compare: (Lump in stomach--China, Bryon, Pulsat); also other Conifers--Thuja, Sabina, Cupressus (painful indigestion) also Nux vom, Kali carb.
Dose
First to thirtieth potency.
Black or Double Spruce. (Northern part of North America.) N. O. Coniferæ. Tincture of the gum.
Clinical
Constipation. Cough. Dyspepsia. Eructations. Hæmorrhages. Hypochondriasis. Malarial fevers. Tea, effects of. Tobacco, effects of.
Characteristics
The grand characteristic of Abies nig. is a sensation in the cardiac end of the stomach or in the œsophagus where it enters the stomach, as if a hard body, as a hard-boiled egg, had lodged there. (China has the lump under the sternum, but higher up. Feeling in the epigastrium as if food were lying there, Pul., Bry.) Where, this symptom is present, whether in dyspepsia, lung disease (when the sensation is as if there was a hard substance to be coughed up) with or without hæmoptysis, constipation, &c. Ab. n. will be, the most likely remedy. The dyspepsias caused by abuse of tea or tobacco have been cured by it. Wakeful at night with hunger. Distress in the head, with flushed cheeks, often accompanies the dyspeptic symptoms of this remedy. In one patient …
Stomach
Sensation in the cardiac end of the stomach, or in the oesophagus where it enters the stomach as if a hard body, or hard boiled egg, laid there.
Phatak's chapter on Abies nigra is available in the app.
Read Phatak in the appClassical texts are in the public domain. Educational reference only — not medical advice.
