Agave americana
Plant · Asparagaceae
Agave americana is indicated in states resembling hydrophobia with extreme excitability, inability to swallow, and aggressive behavior requiring restraint. It also suits scorbutic conditions with hemorrhagic gum disease, painful swollen limbs with purple discoloration, and gonorrheal complaints with strangury and painful erections.
Key symptoms
- Hydrophobia: quarrelsomeness, excitement, inability to swallow
- Scurvy with pale countenance and swollen, bleeding gums
- Legs covered with dark purple blotches, swollen, painful, and hard
- Stomachache; poor appetite; constipated bowels
- Painful erections in gonorrhea; strangury
Century Plant
Indicated in stomachache, and painful erections in gonorrhœa. Strangury. Hydrophobia. Scurvy; countenance pale, gums swollen and bleeding, legs covered with dark purple blotches, swollen, painful and hard. Appetite poor; bowels constipated.
Relationship
Compare: Anhalonium; Lyssin; Lach.
Dose
Tincture
American Aloe. Century plant. N. O. Amaryllidaceæ. Tincture of fresh-chopped leaves.
Clinical
Gonorrhœa. Hydrophobia. Scurvy. Stomacace.
Characteristics
Agave is an unproved remedy. The juice of it fermented is the Mexican intoxicating beverage called "Pulque." The plant has a local reputation as a remedy for hydrophobia. A striking case is quoted by the H. Recorder from El Siglo Medico. A boy developed the classical symptoms of hydrophobia four and a half months after being bitten: Quarrelsomeness, excitement, fright, inability to swallow, small frequent pulse, great anxiety. Finally swallowing was impossible, restraint had to be used to prevent him biting his nurses in the hospital, when, as a last resource, a piece of Agave was offered to the boy by the doctor in attendance, cut from a hedge of the plant with which the hospital grounds were fenced. To the astonishment of all, the boy reached for it and ate it greedily, almost without chewing. By evening a decrease in the violence of the nervous …
Classical texts are in the public domain. Educational reference only — not medical advice.
