Vol. 19 No. 1 February 1999
by James Compton Burnett
When I speak of curing polypus by medicine I mean by the internal administration only. In this case no local application of any kind was used; the patient’s diet was not altered and she did not change her place of abode, or rather habit of going about, so that nothing exists to lessen the value of the evidence of drug action which I shall adduce.
On November 18 some years ago, a gentleman accompanied his wife and he asked me to examine her ear and advise about her state generally. She had become alarmed at the growth of the polypus in her right ear, and had consulted a surgeon in their neighbourhood who had given his opinion that the polypus would have to be excised. He used the word “operate” and this frightened my patient. The surgeon expressed his anxiety about this polypus and insisted that it should be “cut out” as nothing else could “cure” it. How much older will the world get before it knows the meaning of “curing”?
My patient had had a running from the right ear for many years. This otorrhœa was worse whenever she ran down in health, and the discharge soiled her pillow-case a good deal. On the floor of the meatus one saw a polypus of the size of half a marble, and there were two or three smaller ones around it. She had consulted half a dozen doctors in the past about constipation but in vain. Had severe leucorrhoea.
I gave her Hydrastis canadensis 1x, five drops in water three times daily. I saw her again in February, early the following year, but there was no real change. I then gave her Tellurium 6c-one drop in water night and morning.
This medicine was continued for several months and cured first the leucorrhoea, and then the constipation and then the otorrhoea, but the polypus did not go; it did wither a little, and got a little smaller but it was still very visible when the meatus was dilated.
One or two other medicines were given but the polypus persisted in its modified state, and even grew a little once or twice after a cold.
Finally in August, I prescribed Thuja 30c in infrequent doses; spread over four weeks, each dose consisting of two drops on sugar of milk.
My story ends here, for on September 24, the withered-up polypus fell out of the ear. On September 26 I saw the patient and could find no polypus. Patient is now in excellent health, and her ear is well, both of the running and of the polypus.
Without Hahnemann’s homœopathy, I could not have cured the case. The polypus was a sycotic manifestation and the minimum dose of Thuja cured it. Hydrastis did a little good below the midriff; Tellurium cured the otorrhoea, leucorrhoea and constipation. But the polypus would not depart without an antisycotic medicine.