Echinacea angustifolia - Black Sampson, Purple cone flower
"PREPARATIONS: Fluid Extract of the root, miscible with water without material precipitation. Dose: one-fourth to one-half fluid dram. Specific Medicine Echinacea. Dose: five to forty or even sixty drops. Echafolta is a purified, assayed form of Echinacea. The dosage of both is the same. Externally or for surgical purposes it is advised as superior to the other preparations of Echinacea. It is prescribed for the same conditions.
Therapy: Echinacea, is par excellence a corrector of any deprivation of the body fluids. It influences those. conditions included under the terms septic, fermentative and zymotic. Those which manifest themselves in a disturbed balance of the fluids, resulting in alterations of the tissues such as are exhibited in boils, carbuncles. abscesses and cellular and glandular inflammations. These same conditions result from the introduction of the venom of serpents and poisonous insects of every character, also from the introduction of disease germs from pus and other putrid and infectious sources. As an intestinal antiseptic the agent is bound to take first rank with all physicians when once known. Experiments with it to determine its immediate influence upon the fevers caused by continued absorption of septic material, such as typhoid fever, puerperal fever, and the fever of the after-stages of diphtheria, show that its influence upon the pernicious germs begins at once. ...
Its influence in septic fevers is the same as in typhoid. It seems to act as a nerve stimulant upon the vital forces depressed by the poison. This fact was especially true in a case where extreme septic absorption after a badly conducted abortion caused acute nephritis and suppression of the urine. Uremia supervened, with delirium and mild convulsions. Twenty drops of the fluid extract of echinacea were given every two hours continuously. Extreme heat was applied over the kidneys, and a single dose of an antispasmodic was given, the echinacea alone being continued. The fever dropped in two days, the mind cleared, the urinary secretion was restored, and the patient made a rapid and uninterrupted recovery.
It is a most important remedy in uremic poisoning, and will supersede all other single remedies.
It has been in constant use in diphtheria for three years. It is used locally as well as internally. The exudates contract and disappear, the local evidences of septic absorption are gone, the fever declines, the vital forces increase, depression, mental and physical, disappears, and the improvement is continual. In ulcerated sore throat of any character, in ulcerated sore mouth, in stomatitis materni, in post-nasal or catarrhal ulcerations it is prompt and effectual. It is preferred in these cases by those who use it.
In local inflammation of any portion of the intestinal tract, it has given excellent satisfaction. It quickly overcomes local blood stasis, prevents or cures ulceration, and retards pus formation by determining resolution. Reports of its use in appendicitis have been satisfactory, indeed. One writer treated several cases of unmistakable diagnosis, and satisfactory cure resulted. The writer treated one marked case of appendicitis where pus formation and future operation seemed inevitable. The improvement was apparent after the agent had been taken in a few hours, and recovery was complete in twelve days from attack.
Its use in cholera infantum has been satisfactory, especially if nervous phenomena are present. The frequent discharges gradually cease, the patient is soothed and the nerve force increases as the fever abates. Extreme nervous phenomena do not appear. ..."
(Finley Ellingwood: The American Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacognosy, 1915)