Oenothera
Plant · Onagraceae
Oenothera suits patients in states of profound mental and physical prostration characterised by effortless, watery, exhausting diarrhoea. The remedy is indicated when nervous exhaustion accompanies the diarrhoea, even progressing to incipient hydrocephaloid in children. Relief follows copious evacuation of both bowels and bladder.
Key symptoms
- Effortless, exhausting watery diarrhoea without straining
- Nervous exhaustion even approaching incipient hydrocephaloid
- Half-unconscious state; unable to think, raise head, move, or speak
- General numbness with general warm sweat
- Urgent desire to micturate with marked relief after evacuation of both bowels and bladder
- Severe pains in stomach after meals
Worse (aggravation)
- After meals (stomach pains worse)
Better (amelioration)
- After evacuation of bowels and bladder
Œnothera biennis. Large Evening Primrose. Tree Primrose. (North America.) N. O. Onagraceæ. Tincture of fresh plant.
Clinical
Cholera infantum. Diarrhœa. Hydrocephaloid.
Characteristics
There is a proving recorded by T. Riker Nute on a woman who took on two occasions─(1) a teaspoonful, (2) 30 drops of the liquid extract for the relief of a wearisome feeling of mental and physical oppression, and on each occasion, notably the first, distinct poisoning symptoms were developed. A kind of general paralysis of mental and bodily forces was induced, and at the same time copious and easy evacuations of bowels and bladder, followed by relief of the general symptoms. It is in effortless diarrhœa that Œnoth. has been most successfully used in homœopathic practice. Farrington gives the indications: Exhausting, watery diarrhœa without effort; with nervous exhaustion; even incipient hydrocephaloid. Hurd (H. R., x. 419) cured a man, 65, who had "severe pains in his stomach after meals for over two years" with 25-drop …
Classical texts are in the public domain. Educational reference only — not medical advice.
