Organon §235

Sporadic and epidemic intermittent fevers: symptom pattern and recommended treatment.

When it comes to reigning sporadic or epidemic intermittent fevers 197 (not those endemically dwelling in marshy regions) we often find every attack (paroxysm) likewise composed of two opposite reciprocal states [fn232] that alternate with one another (cold-heat, heat-cold). Even more often, each paroxysm is composed of three states (cold-heat-sweat). For this reason, the remedies selected for these intermittent fevers (chosen from the general class of proven medicines, not usually from the antipsorics) must be able to similarly arouse both or all three intermittent states in healthy provers (which is the surest); or as much as possible, they should homeopathically correspond in symptom similarity to the strongest and most peculiar reciprocal state (the cold, the heat or the sweat) along with the accessory symptoms of that state. But especially, the selection of the most apt homeopathic remedy must be guided by the symptoms of the patient's condition in the fever-free time. 198

Comment

197 The hitherto pathology, still in its non-rational childhood, is only aware of a single intermittent fever, which it also calls cold fever [ague]. It makes no distinctions other than the intervals at which the attacks recur (e.g. , daily, every three days, every four days, etc.). There are, however, far more important distinctions among these fevers than their intervals of recurrence. There are countless variations of intermittent fevers, for example:

1. There are many intermittent fevers that cannot be called cold fever at all because their attacks consist only of heat.

2. Other intermittent fevers only have attacks of cold, with or without sweat afterwards.

3. There are others in which the patient is cold all over but feels hot internally, or the patient is hot to the touch but feels cold.

4. There are others in which one paroxysm consists only of shivering or simply feeling cold, followed by feeling well. This is followed by a paroxysm of heat, with or without subsequent sweat.

5. In other fevers, the heat comes first, followed by chill.

6. There are other fevers where the chill and the heat are followed by a period of no fever, and then (often many hours later) there is an attack of sweat only.

7. In some fevers, no sweat follows.

8. In still others, the attack consists only of sweat, without heat or chill.

9. In other fevers, there is sweat but only during the heat.

198 It was Baron von Boenninghausen who in the beginning best elucidated this subject (which requires so much circumspection) and facilitated the selection of the most effective remedy for the different epidemic fevers, through his writing of Versuch einer homцopathischen Therapie der Wechselfieber [Attempt at a Homeopathic Therapy for Intermittent Fevers], Mьnster at Regensberg, 1833.

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