# Lobelia Inflata ## Remedy Classification - **Type:** Homeopathic Remedy - **Miasm:** Psoric Miasm - **Temperament:** Chilly - **Aggravation Time:** Morning ## Keynote Indications Source: Derived from the whole fresh plant of Lobelia inflata, an annual or biennial herb native to. North America, prepared for homeopathic use through trituration and serial dilution to eliminate. toxicity (due to alkaloids like lobeline) and enhance therapeutic action. Traditional Context: Historically employed in homeopathy for respiratory, cardiovascular,. gastrointestinal, and neurological disorders , particularly those involving asthma, nausea, and. spasmodic conditions. It is noted for symptoms such as constricted breathing, oppressive chest. sensations, and vomiting, often aggravated by cold, tobacco exposure, or exertion, and ameliorated. by warmth, rapid motion, or open air. Modern Context: Indicated for respiratory conditions (e.g., asthma, chronic obstructive. pulmonary disease), cardiovascular conditions (e.g., angina, tachycardia), gastrointestinal. conditions (e.g., nausea, gastritis), and neurological conditions (e.g., tension headaches, vertigo). It suits patients with acute or chronic symptoms characterized by constricted breathing , chest. oppression, nausea, spasmodic pains , or faintness, typically exacerbated by cold, tobacco, or. exertion, and often seen in individuals with sensitive, chilly constitutions. The remedy is. particularly relevant for those with a cold, reactive constitution, often presenting with respiratory. symptoms like wheezing or dyspnea alongside systemic symptoms like nausea or dizziness,. commonly observed in patients with asthma, angina, or motion sickness triggered by cold air,. physical exertion, or environmental irritants. ## Modalities (Aggravations / Ameliorations) Worse from: Cold (weather, air, drinks), exertion, tobacco exposure, lying down, night,. damp weather, emotional stress, motion, food, closed rooms, morning. ## Symptoms by System ### Mind - Great depression and exhaustion. - Despondent. - Sobbing and weeping like a child. - Presentiment of death and dyspn ea. - Fear of death. - Felt he was dying with dis tress at chest. - Felt he was dying, but was unconcerned. - Mentally restless. - Confusion after eating, from motion. - Lost his reason and became convulsed, it required several men to hold him. - Violent raving with flushing of face and palpitations. - Great depression and exhaustion. - Despondent. - Sobbing and weeping like a child. - Presentiment of death and dyspn ea. - Fear of death. - Felt he was dying with dis tress at chest. - Felt he was dying, but was unconcerned. - Mentally restless. - Confusion after eating, from motion. - Lost his reason and became convulsed, it required several men to hold him. - Violent raving with flushing of face and palpitations. ### Vertigo - Vertigo with fear of death, nausea. - Vertigo as if starting from left eye. - Cerebral suffering, giddiness. - Headache with slight giddiness. - COMMENTS - In Walter Besant's Life of Ed ward Henry Palmer, Palmer's own account of his cure by lobelia is recorded. - In 1859, he was seized with pulmonary disease, which rapidly increased until he was told he had probably only a few months to live. - On the advice of a herbalist named Sher - ringham, he took a single large dose of lobelia and experienced a violent attack of vomiting, a cold chill mounting up from his feet, to hands, which he could no longer move, to his heart, which ceased to beat, to his throat, which ceased to breathe. - A doctor was sent for. - “I felt myself dying,” he said afterwards, describing the experience, “I was being killed by this dreadful cold spreading all over me. - I was quite certain that my last moments had come. - By the bedside stood my aunt, poor soul, crying. - I saw the doctor feeling my pulseless wrist, watch in hand, the cold dews of death were on my forehead, the cold hand of death was on my limbs. - Up to my lips, but no higher, I thought I was actually dead. - I could see and hear but not speak, not even when the doctor let my hand fall on the pillow and said solemnly, ‘He is gone.'” Palmer said there was no pain, he was in no concern except about a book he wanted to finish. - He recovered suddenly. - New strength came to him. - The tubercu losis was arrested and was no more trouble to him for the rest of his life. - Symptoms concomitant with hereditary syphilis. - Childhood tuberculosis. - Childhood bronchopneumonia. - Imperfect recoveries from chest affections, especially where tubercle threatens. - Severe inflammatory con - ditions existing along with anthrax or with malignant deposits in different regions, useful in repeated as well as in single doses. - Whooping cough with dyspnea threaten ing suffocation. - Must kee p mouth open to breathe. - Asthma with dryness of the throat and mouth, and a constricted feeling as if a band across the chest. - Asthma with stomach nausea and vomiting (Ip.). - Pressive headaches, at the occiput, less frequently at the forehead, sometimes one sided (left), worse by motion, in evening, and especially at night. - Continual periodic headache in the afternoon and increasing until midnight, every third attack being alternately more or less violent. - Headache following intoxication, worse afternoon until midnight, worse from tobacco. - Brain racked by a cough, causing an intol erable pain. - Heat and sweat about the head and face. - Persistent earaches and headaches due to suppressed discharges, where the lips are dry and hot and continual feverish colds are prominent (Ars-i.). - Semi-lateral coating of the tongue. - Continuous nausea with constant flow of saliva and sensitivity to the smell of food or tobacco, especially during pregnancy (Ign., Sep, Colch.). - Gastric derangements, extreme nausea and vomiting. - Vomiting, face bathed in cold sweat. - Sudden pallor with profuse sweat. - Morning sickness, effects of suppressed or missed menstrual periods. - Exfoliating rash, psoriasis. - Faulty second ary digestion. - Thin, poor, without appetite. - Tabes mesenterica. - Pediculi corporis. - Conditions due to suppression, including cases of tuberculosis. - Ailments that never finish, whether beginning from acutely inflammatory causes or not, it also fights with symptoms occasioned by mechanical Lobelia Ínflala irritants, e.g., where a spiculaof bone presses on the brain (compression) or where a bone is lodged in bronchus. - H. - M. - Broderick recorded the case of a young woman, 18, who was ill for two years under allopathic treatment. - Her symptoms included labored breathing, and a sense of t ightness across the chest compelling her to take deep inspirations, which caused pain in heart region. - Pulse full, very rapid, a cough after each deep breath. - She was unable to lie down because of the oppression and pain. - Facial muscles twitched. - Menses never regularly established, would go several weeks over time and then would last only a day. - Lob. - 3x was given in water. - After the second dose she went to bed and slept. - The remedy was repeated just before her next menstrual period. - She had no more attacks and menstruation became normal. - An elderly woman who had not menstruated in two years had pain in her shoulders. - Lob. - relieved the pain and brought on the menses. - Cooper recorded the case of a young woman, 23, with a family history of tuberculosis on both sides. - She had, when 14 to 15 years old, severe pain in the left and sometimes the right side and around her lower abdomen with a faint feeling. - This lasted until the monthly period came on regularly and then she was well until 20, when diarrhea came on, which nothing was able to check and which kept her in bed for months at a time. - The symptoms were pains all around ab domen and up the back, much worse after undressing, feeling of exhaustion or falling to pieces inside and out, and she could not bear anything to touch her. - Four or five bowel movements daily when taking medicine, if she leaves it off, continual movements all day, it literally runs from her, watery, sometimes light-colored, sometimes dark, never bloody. - Menses very irregular, sometimes five to six weeks in between. - All the symptoms, especially diarrhea, worse then, much tenderness all over abdomen, especially in ovarian regions, legs ache fearfully, pains Lobelia ínflala all over body, faints continually. - Since the illness began, she was sub ject to neuralgia of the face, one or the other side, or both, extending to chest, coming and going sud denly at any time. - In spite of treatment of all kinds, including that of a skillful repertorian, she grew worse. - She went into a hospital and there a small pile was removed with but temporary benefit, and after this the vagina as well as the rectum began to copiously discharge an excoriating fluid. - Lob., eight drops three times a day, was now given. - She began to improve at once and in a few weeks was quite well. - In this case, the difficulty first showed itself when the menstruation was commencing. - It was relieved when the flow was regularly established, reappeared simultaneously with menstrual irregularity. - In other cases there is an analogous history. - The nausea has been used in the same way as that of Tab. - and other emetics to produce relaxation of muscles, as, for example, rigid os. - Sometimes this is affected by direct physiological action, but it may be homeopathic as in this cured case, “with every uterine contraction violent dyspnea, which seems to neutralize labor pain, rigid os and perineum.” Cutler experienced a characteristic prickling sensation. - Keynote tenderness of the sacrum. - Cooper noted a symptom recorded by Jahr, “violent pain in the sac rum with fever supervening upon suppression of the menses during their flow.” Alongside this symptom may be placed another, also vouched for by Cooper, the power of eliminating foreign substances (Sil.). - In one case, a woman got a piece of mutton-bone down her windpipe and into one of the bronchials. - She was taken to the London Hospital, but the idea of operation was abandoned as hopeless and she was sent out. - Lob. - tincture was given, five drops three times a day. - Soon a most violent cough was set up in the course of which the patient coughed up a large quantity of fetid pus, and finally the bone. - Teste classed Lob. - with Sulph., and though the provings and clinical experience do not fully bear out what he says about its skin action, the results of botanical practice, confirmed by Cooper, show that it has an anti-psoric action and relieves morbid states due to the suppression of discharges. - P. - H. - Hale said that with the intense nausea it causes, there is sometimes a prickling itching of the skin, and he thinks he has seen benefit from its use in suppressed urticaria with nausea and vomiting. - Teste gave the symptom ‘ ‘eruption between the fingers, on the dorsum of the hands and on the forearms, consisting of small vesicles accompanied by a tingling itching and r esembling the itch pustules exactly.” As with Sulph. - “faintness at the stomach” is a grand characteristic which will be found in a large proportion of the cases calling for the remedy. - Hale quoted Dr. - Cutler's account of his own case. - He had been asthmatic for ten years, liable to very severe and prolonged attacks. - During the intervals the patient scarcely ever passed a night without more or less of it and as often as not was unable to lie in bed. - In the middle of an attack he had a tablespoonful of a fresh plant tincture. - In three or four minutes his breathing was quite free, but there was no nausea and, thinking that necessary, he took another spoonful ten minutes after the first and this occasioned sickness. - Ten minutes later he took a third spoonful, an d this produced a sensible effect on the stomach coats and a very little vomiting and “a kind of prickling sensation through the whole system even to the limbs of the fingers and toes. - The urinary passage was perceptibly affected, by producing a smart ing sensation in passing urine, which was provoked by stimulus on the bladder.” But all these symptoms very soon sub sided and vigor seemed to be restored to the constitution that he had not experienced for years. - Cooper recorded the case of a girl, 9, who was seized with a very bad headache affecting the whole head and continuing night and day for two days, Merc, and Verat-v. - were given in vain. - Lob. - acet., two or three drops in a little water given in the morning after a bad night, gave immediate relief and restored the appetite. - Cooper considered it a meningitis head ache and he finds Lob. - and Kali -i. - 30c especially useful in these. - Excessive sensitiveness is a leading indication for the latter. - A headache with “dull, heavy pain passing around the forehead from one temple to the other, immediately above eyebrows.” G. - W. - Boskowitz related the case of a man, 40, who had twice had gonorrhea, the second attack, three years before, having left him with a gleety discharge. - For a year the stream had been diminishing until at last it took him half an hour to empty the bladder. - Many surgeons had tried to pass an instrument and had failed. - Boskowitz also failed several times, until one day he dropped fifteen drops of Lob. - tincture into the urethra and held the meatus to retain it, for five minutes. - It produced a smarting which soon passed away and then the sound passed with ease. - Boskowitz has used Lob. - in similar cases with success. - Guernsey noted that the “urine has a deep red color and deposits a copious red sedi ment.” Dyspnea, as well as nausea, occur in connection with imperfect menstrual cycles may indicate Lob. - Dr. - Coffin professed to cure children and adults whose lives were despaired of from poisoning by various substances by decoctions of Lob., but whether by directly évacuant action or not it was not stated. - There is some clinical experience of a few drops mixed in water curing a baby of severe convulsions caused by taking in Chlorodyne. - In tincture, Lob. - causes evacuation of the bowels and is an emetic. - It is of service locally as in an enema, and in cases of difficult catheterism. - A few drops of Lob. - in boiling water takes away the pain and tension of inflamed hemorrhoids, the patient sits on a utensil thus filled. - The necessity of taking Lob. - in doses sufficient to cause pathogenic symptoms was insisted on by Thompson and, though it led to some disasters, seems to have been the means of saving some lives. - Thompson tells how, as a boy, he chewed this herb and so learned practically its effects. - He used to give it to other boys out of sport. - One day while mowing he gave a sprig of it to a companion. - By the time they had got six rods the man said he thought the sprig would kill him: he never felt so ill in his life before. - He was in a profuse perspiration, trembled all over and was as pale as a corpse. - Unable to walk, he lay down and vomited “two quarts.” He was helped to his house, ate a good dinner and returned to work in the afternoon. - After this he “felt better than he had for a long time.” This gave Thompson his first notion of the medicinal virtues of Lob. - In a paper read before the Brit. - Hom. - Society, November 1,1888. - Cooper explained that he got no good out of Lob. - until, under the advice of a herbalist, he used a solution made with common vinegar. ### Head - Dull, heavy pain. - Pressive pain on left side of occiput, worse at night and from motion. - Sudden shocks through the head. - Gastric headache with nausea, vomiting and great prostration. - Sick headache with vertigo. - Headaches, worse afternoon until midnight, coughing, from tobacco or tobacco smoke. - Brain racked by cough which causes intolerable pain. - Heaviness in head with lassitude in back. - Wens. - Seborrhea. - Dull, heavy pain. - Pressive pain on left side of occiput, worse at night and from motion. - Sudden shocks through the head. - Gastric headache with nausea, vomiting and great prostration. - Sick headache with vertigo. - Headaches, worse afternoon until midnight, coughing, from tobacco or tobacco smoke. - Brain racked by cough which causes intolerable pain. - Heaviness in head with lassitude in back. - Wens. - Seborrhea. ### Eyes - Burning pain in eyes. - Pain and soreness in right eye. - Itching in angles of eyelids. - Pressing pain in eyeballs, most in upper part. - Pupils dilated. - Hemiopia. - Vision dim. ### Ears - Aching in left ear. - Constantly re curring earaches. - Sudden shutting up of right ear, as if stopped by a plug. - Profuse discharge from the ear. - Shooting pain extending into left ear from painful spot in throat. - Deafness due to suppressed discharges, otorrhea or eczema. ### Face - Sudden pallor. - Bathed in cold sweat. - Sweat on face with nausea. - Heat of face. - Chilly feeling in left cheek extending to ear. - Neuralgia of face with retarded menses. ### Mouth - Acrid, burning taste in mouth, bitter, with foul tongue and thirst. - Mercurial taste. - Sharp, disagreeable taste in mouth at tip of tongue and back of throat. - Profuse salivation with good a ppetite. - Flow of clammy saliva in mouth with nausea. - Tena cious mucus. - Tongue white with a thick coating, on right side only. - Dull, pressing pain in last left molar and temples. - Nose - Nosebleeds. - Tip of nose very cold. - Cannot bear smell or taste of tobacco. - Perspiration - Profuse sweat and prostra tion. - Sweats towards evening or at night. - Copious sweats at night. - Cold sweat. - Sweats after fever. - Sweats with sleep. - Sweats after vomiting, breaks out all over with sweat. - Sweats followed by a sensation as if thousands of needles were piercing her skin from within outward. ### Throat - Burning in throat, dryness of fauces. - Dryness and pricking in throat, not better drinking. - Sensation as if a lump in throat, impeding swallowing and respira tion. - Tickling in larynx with frequent fits of short coughing. - Sensation of fullness in trachea. - Spasmodic croup, with nausea, vomiting and threatening suffocation. ### Chest - Wheezing or dyspnea, with a sensation of tightness or constriction in the chest,. - resembling asthma or COPD, worse with cold, exertion, tobacco exposure, or lying. - down. - Cough or respiratory distress, with a tendency to spasmodic or suffocative attacks,. - resembling bronchitis, aggravated by cold, night, or damp weather. - Chest tightness or oppression, with a sensation of suffocation, resembling pulmonary. - edema, worse with cold or exertion. - Tendency to respiratory hypersensitivity, with aggravation in cold or irritant-exposed. - states. - Palpitations or irregular heartbeat, with a sensation of fluttering or oppression,. - resembling tachycardia or supraventricular tachycardia, worse with cold, exertion, or. - emotional stress. - Chest pain or angina, with a sensation of constriction or heaviness, resembling. - coronary artery disease, aggravated by cold, lying on the left side, or exertion. - Faintness or syncope, with a sensation of weakness or collapse, resembling. - vasovagal syncope, worse with cold or standing. - Tendency to cardiovascular hypersensitivity, with aggravation in cold or exertional. - states. - Gastrointestinal:. - Nausea or vomiting, with a sensation of fullness or burning, resembling gastritis or. - motion sickness, worse with cold, food, motion, or tobacco exposure. - Gastric distress or bloating, with a tendency to aggravation after eating, resembling. - functional dyspepsia, aggravated by cold, exertion, or night. - Spasmodic abdominal pain, with a sensation of cramping or tightness, resembling. - irritable bowel syndrome, worse with cold or emotional stress. - Tendency to gastrointestinal hypersensitivity, with aggravation in cold or irritated. - states. - Neurological:. - Tension headaches or migraines, with a sensation of tightness or throbbing,. - resembling tension-type headache or migraine, worse with cold, exertion, or light. - Vertigo or dizziness, with a sensation of spinning or unsteadiness, resembling BPPV. - or motion sickness, aggravated by cold, motion, or exertion. - Trembling or weakness, with a sensation of nervousness or fatigue, resembling. - essential tremor, worse with cold or emotional stress. - Tendency to neurological hypersensitivity, with aggravation in cold or exertional. - states. - Lobelia inflata (Indian Tobacco) 1251. ### Stomach & Abdomen - Faintness and weakness of epigastrium. - Sensation as if esophagus were contracted from below upward. - As if a lump or heavy load in stomach. - Acrid, burning taste, acidity with contractive feeling in stomach. - Acidity, flatulence, shortness of breath after eating. - Frequent gulping up of a burning, sour fluid. - Profuse flow of saliva with retching, hiccough, dyspnea with good appetite. - Heartburn with profuse flow of saliva. - Hiccough followed by drowsiness. - Extreme nausea and vomiting. - Deathly nausea with vertigo, better by a little drink or food, worse night and early morning. - Nausea with prickling itching of skin. - Nausea and vomiting with profuse sweat, on face with respiratory symptoms. - Morning sicknes s, suddenly disappears better by a little food and drink. - Temperature - Chilliness, coldness, of whole body, better near fire or fromheat, worse after drinking. - Thirst before the chill and through the whole fever. - Intermittent fevers, commencing at noon with great paleness and anorexia. - Heat with tendency to perspire. - Abdomen distended with shortness of breath. - Cutting and drawing pains in abdomep, worse after eating with headache. - Sudden sharp pain, in left side of abdomen. - Violent and painful constric tion in epigastrium. - Griping and twisting with nausea, violent risings and emission of foul flatus. - Borborygmi. - Rumbling in bowels and passage of flatus downward. - Intussusception of bowels. - Incarcerated hernia. ### Urinary & Genital - Fatiguing heaviness, weight, in genital parts. - Smarting of the prepuce. - Suppressed menses. - Menses too early, too profuse. - During menstruation violent pain in sacrum. - Labor pains with shortness of breath, rigid os and perineum. - Pain in her sacrum and a sense of weight in genitals. - Violent pain in the sacrum with fever. ### Extremities - Shooting pains through whole body, into fingertips and toes. - Rheumatic feeling in right shoulder joint, goes to left upper arm and around elbow joint. - Fine crawling stitches inside of right deltoid. - Rheumatic pain in right elbow joint. - Sweat of palms, backs of hands dry and cool, fingertips cold. ### Neck & Back - Pain in sacrum, cannot bear slightest touch. - Sits leaning f orward. - Swelling and pain left side of neck. - Rheumatic pain between the scapula. - Dull pressure between scapula. - Pain under right scapula worse bending forward. - Burning, in back, as if in posterior wall of stomach. - Breasts - Pain in the breast. - Burning feeling in breast, passing upward. - A tightness of the breast with heat in forehead. - Drawing in left breast from nipple to axilla. - Causations - Alcohol, tea, tobacco, smoke. - Wetting feet. - Suppressions. - Foreign bodies. ### Skin - Prickling, it ching all over body, with nausea. - Vesicular itch -like pustules with tingling itching. - Vesicular eruption on skin. - Eruption between fingers, on dorsum of hands and on forearms. - Plaques of edema with ecchymoses. ### Sleep - Yawning, followed by crawling in nose and sneezing. - Y awning and belching of gas. - Disturbed sleep with many dreams, sometimes anxious, painful dreams. - Dreams are many without intermediate awakening, cold sweats. - Dream that arm was amputated, of being wound ed by a shot. - Wakened early by very vivid dreams. ### Generalities - As if foreign body in throat. - As if lump in pit of throat. - As if esophagus contracted from below upward. - As if a lump rose up to meet food and obstruct its descent. - As if a lump or heavy load in stomach. - Fullness in trachea as if from chest. - As if a lump in larynx. - As if the heart would stand still. - As if a band about chest. - As if blood stagnated in chest (better moving about). - As if thousands of needles were pricking her skin from within outward.