# Guaiacum Officinale

## Remedy Classification
- **Type:** Herbal Remedy
- **Miasm:** Tubercular Miasm
- **Temperament:** Chilly
- **Aggravation Time:** Neutral/Anytime

## Keynote Indications
Guai., which is one of Hahnemann's anti -psorics, is best known as a remedy in govt and 
rheumatism and as a di uretic, but it has also taken a place in old -school therapeutics as a remedy for 
tuberculosis. Guai. was first recommended by Brinton in the Lancet in 1857 for quinsy, was given in full doses 
and produced a crisis of sweat and profuse urination. 
Homeopathic provings developed and defined the sphere of its utility in these respects and many more. It acts 
on mucus membranes, muscles, fibrous tissue, joints and bones. Arthritic diathesis. Acute rheumatism. Gouty 
nodosities on joints. Nodes. Exostosis. Growing pains. Tonsillitis with rheumatism. Secondary syphilis. 
Contraction of limbs, stiffness and immo bility. Muscles and tendons are contracted, resulting in pain, rigidity 
and swelling o f the joints, and deformity. Muscles and tendons seem too short or feel sore. Contractions 
between scapulae, palms etc., causing distortions and immobility. 
Unclean odor from whole body. Promotes suppuration of abscesses. Free foul, secretions, expectoration, 
sweat, etc. Bones become spongy or suppurate. Burning heat in affected part. Sensitiveness and aggravation 
from local heat. 
Gnawing or sticking pains in chest. Pains often end in stitch, especially head. Contractive pain between 
scapula. Violent pains in limbs after a cold. Feeling that he must yawn, stretch with uneasy feeling in the whole 
body. 
Violent, spasmodic inflammatory disorders of windpipe and larynx with palpitation, preventing motion or calling 
for help, feels suffocating. Cough dry or with copious bloody or purulent expectoration of very offensive odor. 
Heat, swelling and blotchiness of face. Prosopalgia every day from 6 p.m. to 4 a.m. Toothache when biting 
jaws together. 
Progressive emaciation. Desire for apples, which helps the gastric  symptoms, and a general aversion to milk 
and food. “Violent hunger afternoon and evening,” similar to the “sinking” sensations of Sulph. and the anti -
psorics. Nausea from sensation of phlegm in throat. 
Marked flatulence. “Every morning vomits a mass of watery phlegm with great exertion, followed by great 
exhaustion.” Morning diarrhea with dry skin and chilli ness. Cholera infantum, the face is like that of an old 
person. Constipation, dry, hard, crumbling and very offensive stool. 
Continuous urging even after urination with profuse fetid urine. Stitches in neck of bladder after ineffectual 
pressure to urinate. Cutting while urinating. 
General ill feeling, better yawning and stretching, worse from the least motion. Clothes feel damp. Perspiration 
on head on walking in open air. Chilly crawls over breasts. Chilliness in back. Cannot bear heat with pains in 
limbs. Marked periodicity. Stomach illness returns every summer. MIND - Indolent, obstinate, fretful. Disinclina-
tion to labor. Sadanddepressed. Weakmemo ry. Forgetful, thoughtless, staring. Forgetful of names. Slow to 
comprehend. Delusion everything seems narrow. 
Strong desire to criticize and despise every thing. Inclination to blame everybody and scold. Defiant. 
Disobedience. Shrieking during sleep. Weeping after nightmare.

## Modalities (Aggravations / Ameliorations)
Better external pressure. Better apples. Better yawning and stretching. Better from cold locally. 
Worsefrom heat. Worse cold, wet weather. Worse touch. Worse motion. Worse exertion. Worse rapid growth. 
Worse mercury. Worse puberty. Worse 6 p.m. to 4 a.m.

## Symptoms by System

### Vertigo
- Vertigo on rising.
- COMMENTS - Affected parts are very sensitive to touch, worse from heat.
- Offensive secretions.
- Rheumatism 
in syphilitic and mercurial patients.
- Growing pains in children.
- Acute tonsillitis, simple or rheumatic.
- Syphilitic sore throat.
- “Burning in the throat.” Erythematous or 
inflammatory angina with bright redness (Bell.).
- Edema (Apis.).
- Phlegmon with tendency to suppuration of 
tonsils (Bar-c., Apis.).
- Burning sensations in mouth, throat and stomach.
- Stitches in chest going from front to back or from below 
upward in region of apex, worse from motion and deep inspira tion.
- “Sharp pain abo ut mid-day under right 
breast to shoulder.” 
Neuralgia of left side of head and face, extending to neck.
- Sharp stitches in brain.
- Sensation as if the brain 
were loose.
- External headache with sensation as if blood vessels were over-filled, extending to face and neck.
- Tearing pains in skull.
- Swelling and sensation of swelling in eyes and nose.
- Eyes feel protruded.
- Ozanam gave it in the 1c, 2c and 3c dilutions and found that he got the cura tive effects without crisis, which 
was an unnecessary effect of the dr ug.
- Guai., said Ozanam, seems to combine the properties of Bell., Apis 
and Bar-c.
- Houghton cured with Guai.
- 3x a case of gouty inflammation of the meatus of the ear and tympanum after failure 
with Ferr-p.
- Concomitant rheumatic lameness and soreness led him to Guai.
- Verwey treated a woman, who for sev eral years had a frequently recurring gouty inflammation of the knees.
- After Chin.
- 30c had failed to relieve, Guai.
- 30c was given without obvious benefit.
- Guai.
- 1c was then given, 
and after a few hours the swelling broke and the pains quickly subsided.
- A short time after, the same patient ac cidentally injured the same knee.
- Under Guai.
- 1c the swelling soon 
broke and the pain was relieved, but an abscess formed at the same time on the upper thigh.
- The pain became 
unbearable and the patient's husband “begged for more of the drops that had twice before made the swelling 
break.” 
It was again given and in six hours the abscess evacuated.
- On two later occasions Dr.
- Verwey saw Guai.
- act 
in the same way on scrofulous and gouty abscesses.
- This is probably analogous to its action in quinsy.

### Head
- Gouty and rheumatic pain in head and face, extending to neck.
- Tearing pain in skull, worse cold, 
wet weather.
- Pains often end in a stitch, especially in head.
- Head feels swollen and blood vessels distended.
- Brain feels loose.
- Headache better walking and pressure, worse sitting and standing.
- Kidneys - Continuous urging, even after urination.
- Sharp stitches during or after urination.
- Gouty and rheumatic pain in head and face, extending to neck.
- Tearing pain in skull, worse cold, 
wet weather.
- Pains often end in a stitch, especially in head.
- Head feels swollen and blood vessels distended.
- Brain feels loose.
- Headache better walking and pressure, worse sitting and standing.
- Kidneys - Continuous urging, even after urination.
- Sharp stitches during or after urination.

### Eyes
- Exophthalmos.
- Pupils dilated.
- Eye balls seem too big to be covered by  the eyelids, or eyelids appear 
too short.
- Hard pimples around the eyes.

### Ears
- Aching in left ear.

### Face
- Neuralgia of the left side of the face, daily from 6 p.m.
- to 4 a.m.
- Face like an old person.

### Mouth
- Tongue furred.
- Nose - Pains in bones of nose.
- Nose swollen.
- Fluent coryza.
- Perspiration - Profuse sweat on single parts, face, etc.
- Sweats at night.
- Much sweat, especially on head and 
face.
- Sweats on walking in open air.
- Sweat is usually offensive.

### Throat
- Dry.
- burning, swollen.
- Sharp stitches towards the ear on swallowing, cannot swallow without a drink.
- Acute tonsillitis,  painful to touch.
- Recurrent ton sillitis followed by rheumati sm.
- Syphilitic sore throat.
- Rheumatic sore throat with weak throat muscles.

### Chest
- Pleuritic stitches.
- Chest pains in articulations of ribs, with shortness of breathing until expectoration 
sets in.
- Pain in the chest while riding in the open air, better pressure and walking, worse sitting and standing.
- Feels suffocated.
- Recurrent pleurisy.
- Pleuritic stitches, worse deep breathing.
- Stitching in apex of 
(left) lung.
- Tuberculosis.
- Dry.
- tight cough.
- Fetid breath after coughing.

### Stomach & Abdomen
- Thick, white fur on tongue.
- Constricted epigastric region.
- Burning in stomach.
- Vomits a mass of 
watery mucus, then exhaustion.
- Stomach disorders return in summer.
- Temperature - Sweat profuse on single parts, face etc.
- Night sweats.
- Burning of body.
- Hot palms.
- Burning 
fever with hot face and dry cough.
- Fever with chill in the evening.
- Distention, flatulent.
- Intestinal fermentation.
- Sensation of constriction or stoppage in epigastrium, 
causing cough, dyspnea.
- Aversion to milk, to all food, could not eat anything.
- Desire for apples and other fruits, which relieve 
gastric symptoms.

### Urinary & Genital
- Seminal emissions without dreams.
- Discharge from urethra.
- Ovaritis in the rheumatism, with irregular menstruation, dysmenorrhea and irritable bladder.

### Extremities
- Growing pains (Calc-p.).
- Arthritis deformans.
- Arthritic lancinations fol- lov/ed by contraction of limbs.
- Sciatica and lumbago.
- Gouty tearing pains with contractions.
- Immovable stiffness.
- Joints swollen, painful 
and intolerant of pressure, can bearno heat.
- Stinging pain in the limbs.
- Feeling of heat in the affected limbs.
- Rheumatic pain in shoulders, arms and 
 
 
hands.
- Rheumaticpain in wrists.
- Pricking in buttocks, as if sitting on nee dles.
- Hamstrings too short.
- Ankle 
pain extending up the leg, causing lameness.

### Neck & Back
- Pain from head to neck.
- Aching in nape.
- Stiffneck and sore shoulders.
- Contractive pain bet ween 
scapulae.
- Stitches between scapulae to occiput.
- One-sided stiffness of back from neck to sacrum.
- Breasts - Cold crawling over breasts.
- Shuddering in breasts with goose bumps.

### Sleep
- Yawns and stretches for relief of general ill feeling.
- Frequent waking from sleep, as if from falling.