Phytolacca decandra

as H.C. Allen recorded it in Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of Some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica, 1899

This is one author on one remedy. The few symptoms that, when genuinely present, point at one remedy and not its neighbours. Read Phytolacca decandra in every book at once →

Keynotes

Phytolacca decandra

Poke Root. Phytolaccaceae.

Patients of a rheumatic diathesis; rheumatism of fibrous and periosteal tissue ; mercurial or syphilitic.

Emaciation, chlorosis ; loss of fat.

Great exhaustion and profound prostration.

Occupies a position between Bryonia and Rhus ; cures when these fail, though apparently well indicated.

In rheumatism and neuralgia after diphtheria, gonorrhoea, mercury or syphilis.

Pain flying like electric shocks; shooting, lancinating; rapidly shifting (Lac c.. Puls.) ; worse from motion and at night.

Entire indifference to life; sure she will die.

Vertigo; when rising from bed feels faint (Bry.).

Intense headache and backache; lame, sore bruised feeling all over; constant desire to move but motion < pains (Lac c., Mer. — motion >, Rhus).

Irresistible desire to bite the teeth or gums together (Pod.) ; during dentition.

Sore throat; of a dark red color; uvula large, dropsical, almost translucent (Kali bi., Rhus).

Diphtheria : pains shoot from throat into ears on swallowing; great pain at root of tongue when swallowing; burning, as from a coal of fire or a red-hot iron; dryness; difficult to swallow with trembling of the hands; sensation of a lump in the throat with continuous desire to swallow; tonsils, uvula and back part of throat covered with ash-colored membrane; cannot drink hot fluids (Each.).

Carotid and submaxillary glands indurated, after diphtheria, scarlet fever.

Mammae full of hard, painful nodosities.

Breast; shows an early tendency to cake; is full, stony, hard and painful, especially when suppuration is inevitable; when child nurses pain goes from nipple all over body (goes to back, Crot. t. ; to uterus. Puls., Sil.).

Mammary abscess ; pstulce^ gaping, angry idcers; pus sanious, ichorous, fetid; unhealthy.

Tumefied breast neither heals nor suppurates, is of a purple hue and “hard as old cheese” (Bry., Lac c., Phel.).

Nipples, sensitive, sore, fissured (Graph.) ; < intensely by nursing, pain radiates over whole body.

Hastens suppuration (Hep., Lach., Men, Sil.).

Aggravation.. — When it rains; exposure to damp, cold weather. Compare : Kali i. its analogue.

What the other books say about Phytolacca decandra

The same remedy read by a different author. They disagree, and the disagreements are where the remedy becomes recognisable.

Phytolacca decandra in Boericke — The concise clinical Materia Medica that most Indian colleges teach from, in full.
Phytolacca decandra in Kent — Kent teaching a class, one remedy at a time — fewer remedies, far more on each.
Phytolacca decandra in Boger — A compressed key — the generals and the characteristic modalities, with very little narrative.

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← Every remedy in Allen's Keynotes

Cite this page. H.C. Allen. Keynotes and Characteristics with Comparisons of Some of the Leading Remedies of the Materia Medica. 3rd edition (1910). Philadelphia: Boericke & Tafel. Phytolacca decandra — Keynotes, pp. 224–225. HomeopathyWorld, https://homeopathyworld.in/materia-medica/books/allen/phytolacca-decandra. Published 1910: public domain in the US (before 1931) and in India (author died 1909). Replaces B. Jain's 2005 "rearranged and classified" edition (© the publisher), per the owner's decision of 13 Sep 2026. Reproduced as the author wrote it; a historical reference for students and practitioners, not medical advice.