Verbena Hastata
NAT. ORD., Verbenaceae.
COMMON NAMES, Blue Vervain, Purvain, Wild Hyssop.
PREPARATION.--One part of the fresh plant, in flower, is macerated in
two parts by weight of alcohol.
(An extract from a paper by Dr. J. N. White, Queen City,
Texas, detailing at length the case of a five-year-old
boy, who, after six weeks of whooping cough, developed
epil
ptic symptoms, having as high as twelve spasms in
twenty-four hours. After two months of treatment with
such remedies as Solanum Car., Sulphonal,
Hyoscyamus, Cannabis Ind., Calomel, Zinc, etc.,
with no results, the case was given Verbena hastata.
Another doctor was in consultation and we quote:)
I told my friend (the Doctor) that when he became satisfied with the
zinc treatment I wanted to try another eclectic remedy. (The Doctor was
an allopath.) He was perfectly willing and I put him on Verbena
hastata, 12 minims every four hours, skipping the dose at midnight.
After we both took the case we decided, as there were no curative
properties in the sulfonal, we would drop it, and not use anything to
control the paroxysms, and consequently the boy seemed to get worse to
the parents, as he would have several falling spells a day. From the
first dose of the Verbena hastata the boy began to improve. He would
have contractions of the muscles of the arms and legs and look wild for
a minute or more for the first week, but after that he never had another
symptom. We kept him on the medicine, as above, for six weeks, and now
he takes twelve drops three times a day.
He has not had any symptom in over two months, and all that wild vacant
look is gone, and he plays, eats, sleeps, etc., as if he had never been
troubled with epilepsy.