Homoeopathic medicines from Fungi

Dr Meera Narendran BHMS,MD(Hom)

Homoeopathic Medicines made out of fungi and their preparation, properties and clinical indications

Fungi are a group of spore producing organisms, feeding on organic matters, including moulds, yeast, mushrooms, and toadstools. It belongs to neither plant nor animal kingdom. They are included as a separate division.

Mainly they are divided into 3 types
(1) Basidiomycota  Eg: – Mushrooms, toadstool, puffball Bracket fungi etc.
(2) Ascomycota   Eg:- Yeast, Mildews, Truffles etc.
(3) Zygomycota  Eg:-Mould like fungi

They have no leaves due to which their metabolism is catabolic. They are composed of mycelia networks, which are made of fine hyphae- thread like columns of simple cells. The fungi play a major role in decomposing organic matter into inorganic. They can also cause diseases in plants, animals, and humans.

Since humans first used fungi the poisonous nature of some of them have been recognized. One group of fungi assimilates poisonous substances, which attack human organs such as the liver, the kidneys, and the blood circulation with potentially fatal consequences.

The most dangerous of these fungal poisons are:
(1) x- amanitin
This is the poison of the bulbosus agarics. It leads to the destruction of the liver even in small quantities and is the most frequent cause of fungal poisoning.

(2) Orellanin :It leads to protracted poisonings often with permanent kidney damage.

(3) Gyromitrin:This also acts similarly to x- amanitin. It is the poison of gyromitra-esculental turban fungus.

(4) Muscarin
This poisonous substance is contained in many species of fungi. It acts as a nerve poison and affects the heart and blood circulation.It has been only recently discovered that some naturally growing fungi contain considerable amount of poisonous heavy metals like lead, quick silver and most of all cadmium.

Name of the homoeopathic remedies from the fungi

• (1) Agaricus Campestris
• (2) ,, Citrinus
• (3) ,, Emeticus
• (4) ,, Muscaricus
• (5) ,, Pantherinus
• (6) ,, Phalloides
• (7) ,, Procerus
• (8) ,, Semiglobatus
• (9) ,, Strecoranius
• (10) Boletus Laricis
• (11) ,, Luridus
• (12) ,, Satanas
• (13) Bouisla Nigrescens
• (14) Phallus Impudicus
• (15) Polyporus pinicola
• (16) Psilocybe caerulescens
• (17) Russula Foetens
• (18) Secale Cornutum
• (19) Solanum Tuberesum Aegrotans
• (20) Torula Cerevisiae
• (21) Ustilago Mydis

Also added

• Thalaspi Bursa-Pastoris

A plant belonging to family cruciferae. A fungus always invades Thalapsi and its drug picture is due to the fungus parasite and not due to the host plant.

Sphere of action
(1) Central nervous system
(2) Peripheral nervous system
(3) Blood vessels -circulation
(4) Female sexual organs- uterus
(5) Skin

Pathogenesis
(1) Central nervous system
They involve the completely cerebrospinal axis, producing irritation, inflammation, and degeneration
(2) Peripheral nervous system
Produces severe multiple neuritis.
(3) Blood vessels
(a) Spasm- ischemia- gangrene
(b) Dilatation- relaxation-hemorrhage
(4) Connective tissues
Hypertrophy-Fibroids-Tumors atrophy
(5) Skin
Inflammation
Exudation
Eczema

GENERAL FEATURES OF FUNGI
(1) Tendency to involuntary movements like twitching , jerking;
Agaricus

• Twitching of single parts, chorea
• Trembling,twitching,jerking especially of the eyelids and tongue
• Twitching ceases during sleep
• There will be nystagmus, uncertain gait.

Bovista

• Awkward motions, drop things
• Twitching of facial muscles before asthma

Secale cor

• Twitchings,Spasms with fingers apart
• Cramps with stiffness and gnawing in single parts
• Tetanic spasms with full consciousness
• Tingling in back extending to fingers and toes
• Trembling,staggering or shuffling gait as if feet were dragged along

Ustilago : Clonic tetanic movements

(2) Tendency to develop paraesthesias like tingling, numbness with or without pain or Twitching
Agaricus

• Sensation as if pierced by cold or hot needles.
• Neuralgia as if cold needles run through the nerves
• Shooting and burning along the spine
• Burning, itching, redness and swelling as if frozen.

Bovista
Multiple neuritis with tingling and numbness

Secale cor

• Numbness, insufferable tingling, crawling starting in the face, on the back, in the limbs, in the fingertips > rubbing, on the tip of the tongue and throat.
• Sensation of burning, as if sparks in the whole body.
• Feels as if walking on velvet
• Formicating of the skin.

Ustilago

• Sensation of boiling water flowing along the back

(3) Tendency to hemorrhages
Bovista

• Nose bleed, persistent epistaxis in drunkards
• Bleeding dark, offensive and stingy
• Metrorrhagia-especially during climaxis

Secale cor

• Nose bleed-persistent dark with prostration in old people and drunkards
• Hemorrhages- thin,faetid,watery, black oozing continuously csly menses
• Bleeding of gums
• Hemorrhage after extraction of teeth
• Haematemesis
• Bloody urine

Ustilago

• Congestive, passive or slow bleeding dark watery or in clots forming large black strings.
• Vicarious menstruation

(4)Tendency to increased sexual desire with masturbation
Agaricus

• Increased sexual desire in males
• Sexual excitement in females

Bovista

• Increased sexual desire in males
• Voluptuous sensation, tingling, coitus like
• Coition aggravates
• Dreams- amorous
• Dreams- amorous- pollutions with

Ustilago

• Irresistible desire to masturbate
• Erotic fancies
• Emissions every night
• Emissions even while talking to women

(5) Easy prostration especially after coitus or sexual abuse
Agaricus
Male

• Great debility after coition
• Complaints after sexual debauches

Female

• Complaints following coitus
• Young hysterical married women who faint after coition
• Bovista – Reeling and confusion in head after coition
• Ustilago Prostration after sexual abuse

(6) Tendency to catch cold .feels very chilly yet aversion to covering
Agaricus

• Frequent sneezing without coryza
• Flow of clear water without coryza
• Sneezing after coughing

Bovista

• Chilly patient
• Sensitive to cold
• Chilly during pain

(7) Especially suitable to females during climaxes
Agaricus
Bearing down pain especially after menopause
Ustilago
Menorrhagia at climaxis
Congestion of various part especially during climaxis
Irritability at climaxis

(8) Tendency to form new growth
Bovista
Para-ovarian cyst
Boil in the right ear with pain and discharge of faetid pus
Secale cor
Lymphoid tumors
Boils which mature slowly with green pus
Bloody blisters
Ustilago
Important for fibroid tumors

Agaricus
This is commonly known as mushroom. Agaricus comes under the order Agaricales of the Basidiomycetes class. This is a saprophytic fungus growing on damp rotten logs of wood, trunks of trees and in damp soil rich in organic matter.
Some types of Agaricus are edible. Others are Poisonous. The edible mushrooms are cultivated and these are white in colour. The colored types are usually poisonous.

AGARICUS MUSCARIUS
C.N. – Bug Agaric
Habitat – Europe and America
Preparation – Trituration of the carefully dried-up cap or -O- of the fresh fungus

It contains 3 toxic principles
(1) Muscarine -A parasympathomimetic alkaloid
(2) A neutron toxic substance
(3) An alkaloid with atropine like action

Characteristics
This agent produces a state of intoxication and is used in many parts for making an intoxicating drink. Thus, we find in alcoholism a spear of its action and in all states of delirium, mania, and even idiocy.
The peculiarity of delirium is to make verses and prophesy silly merriness, and incoherent talk, with mania; Kisses companions.
There is an exalted notion of grandeur and power, hilarity, excitement followed by depression, confusion, and imbecility.

Accompanying Physical Symptoms are

• Vertigo, with Constant impulse to fall backward
• Twitching about eyes and face
• Redness without heat
• Puffy and distorted appearance
• Ravenous appetite with bolting of food
• Sexual appetite enormous and enthusiastic with relaxed penis and impotence.
• There is involvement of motor nerves > Spasmodic twitching, through out the body, tremors. Choreiform movements and convulsions of the epileptic form type. Finally, there is relaxation and exhausion.Twitching is marked in eyes, eyelids, facial muscles.
• Rolling of the head is a leading indication of Agaricus in brain affections and fever.
• Peculiar headache are “Throbbing headache , with sensation of stiffness of muscles of face”
• Dull drawing headache in the morning , extending in to root of nose, with nose bleed or thick mucous discharge
• Pain as if pierced by needles of ice is very characteristic.
• Sweat- May be oily, but is not offensive.
• It is a spleen medicine, causing stitch in the left side.
• The symptoms are apt to appear at the same time on opposite sides of the body but diagonally.
• Highly sensitive to cold and damp
• Many symptoms appear when walking in the open air
• Conversely, to sensitiveness to cold, there is sensitiveness to the rays of the sun and sunstroke is within the curative range of Agaricus.
• There are symptoms of gastro-enteric irritation.

With this indications, Agaricus is of use in :

•  Epilepsy
•  Chorea
•  Frostbite
•  Sunburn
•  Typhoid fever
•  Alcoholism

Agaricus emeticus
A small acrid species found in woods in Europe

Preparations:
Mother tincture from the fresh mushrooms
The symptoms of Agaricus Emeticus resembles those of . other Agaricus, but they have this characteristic that while . cold water< the symptoms of Agaricus Muscarins , it speedily
and permanently relieves those of Agaricus Emeticus.
There is violent longing for ice-cold water
Most marked is the vertigo, which is so severe one must be carried to bed; he is not able to sit or stand.

AGARICUS PHALLOIDES
A small stinking fungus it is a poison of great intensity and fatality. Toxins are cytotoxic alpha amanitine and Phalloidine. These toxins inhibit protein synthesis. It causes Necrosis, Oedema and hemorrhage in liver, kidney, GIT, and brain

Symptoms observed in poisoning give a complete picture of Asiatic cholera

• Extreme prostration with cold sweat, chilliness thirst, cold extremities etc
• Crampy pain in abdomen
• Small intermittent pulse
• Finally-Circulatory collapse, hepatic and renal failure

BOLETUS LARICIS
Synonym – Polyporus officinalis
White Agaric
Its active principle is Agaric Acid or Agaricin
Prepared from the dried fungus

Characteristic
Symptoms of gastro-intestinal irritation (Chronic diarrhea )
Periodical neuralgia

BOLETUS LURIDUS
Characteristics

• Poisoning effects show delirium
• Sunken features
• Violet colour of nose and lips
• Intense thirst
• Violent pain in epigastrium
• Urticaria

BOLETUS SATANAS
It produces gastro intestinal disturbances.

BOVISTA
C.N. – Warted Puff-ball
Bovista comes under Basidiomycetes

Characteristics
Bloatedness,Puffy condition of body surface
A sense of ‘enlargement’
Flatulent distention and noisy passage of flatus are leading features of the Bovista Pathogenesis
This agent has an action on the circulation, predisposing to relaxation and hemorrhages – h’ges from menstrual irregularities from traumatism etc.
Menstrual flow occurring only or chiefly at night, haemorrage between periods
Menses preceded and followed by diarrhea
Acrid corrosive lencorrhoea, following at night only, follows menses
With this symptoms it can be of use in ovarian cyst
There is stammering speech
Awkwardness, misapplies words in speaking and writing
The puffy, expanding properties of the remedy are shown as a  puffy condition of the body surface; instrument indent the fingers in an unusual degree.
Useful in colic causing the patient to bend double
Action up on the skin producing an eruption similar to eczema
Itching at tip of coccyx is another characteristic symptom’
Useful in c/c urticaria
Sweat in axilla smelling like onions
We may always think of bovista when we see a very ‘tettery’ person, one who has tetters here and there, all over the body.
There utters maybe either moist or dry’.
Symptoms generally are < morning, cold food…hot weather

PHALLUS IMPUDICUS  (Stink horn)
Prepared by infusion of whole fungus

Characteristics
There is a general resemblance to the effect of the Agarici-Vertigo, disordered vision, gastro- entric disturbances & viscid sweat.assossiated with great feebleness of whole body.

PLYPORUS PINICOLA
Pine agaric, * From Fresh plant

Characteristics

• Despondency
• Aching distress in many parts
• Stiffness of muscles
• Dysphagia
• Diarrhoea or constipation and piles
• Usefull in Malarial fevrs
• The Symptom < Motion  > Rest

RUSSULA
From the fresh mushrooms
Some species of Russula are edible others causes severe poising

Characteristics
Hallucinations
Muscular tremors & clonic spasms
Eye symptoms are pronounced complete blindness lasting many days with this peculiarity of pupil that it was some times normal, sometimes dilated, and sometimes contracted.

SECALE COR
Ergot
The fungus growing on the seed bud of rye& several other cereals. Ergot Alkaloids are highly variable mixtures of toxins the most important being ergotamine. When ingested, the toxin produces either Cardiovascular or neurological manifestations.

Cardio vascular Manifestations – Vasoconstriction and Peripheral gangrene
Neurological – Mental Confusion & convulsions

One of the alkaloid Lysergic acid lathylamide act as a hallucinogen
It acts upon the Parturient uterus as a stimulated to its contractions & increases their force and frequency till there is titanic contractions of the organs.

Characteristics
(1)This drug is especially adapted to thin scrawny women with Sunken features.
(2) Women of very lax muscular fiber, where everything seems loose & open

Hemorrhagic diathesis
The slightest wound causes bleeding for weeks
Discharge of liquid blood with a strong tendency to putrescence.
(3) Debility & emaciation, though there is unnatural ravenous appetite
(4) Craving for acids, lemonade
(5) Burning in all parts of the body as if sparks of fire were falling on the part
(6) Skin feels cold to touch ; yet the patient cannot tolerate covering , there is burning hot internally, < external heat : > Cold applications
(7) The nervous symptoms are convulsive. The body is rigid, at times altering with relaxation. This is especially seen in hands, which are either clenched or have the spread widely apart.

Therapeutics
(1) Great Haemorrhagic remedy- from any out let, generally from Uterus-
It takes place from atony of uterus, especially after abortion or protracted Labour The flow is black , fluid, non- coagulable & offensive

(2) Secale is one of the few remedies for patients suffering from habitual abortions
Miscarriage taking place about third month with copious flow of black, bad smelling, liquid blood. She gets cramps in her fingers- fingers are spread widely apart.

(3) During Labour
Irregular pain, too weak with no expulsive action, though everything is relaxed. Everything seems loose and open, but no expulsive action. It is of use for after pains – too long and painful with hour- glass contraction of the Uterus
(4) Suppression of milk in thin exhausted women
(5) Puerperal fever with putrid discharge, coldness of skin etc.
(6) Cholera
Profuse, watery, offensive diarrhea
Cramps
Empty feeling in Abdomen wants abdomen uncovered
In the stage of collapse
(7) Raynauld’s disease
(8) Ecchymosis , blood blisters etc.
(9) Boils- Mature slowly and heal in the same manner with green pus.

USTILAGO
Corn- spur – a parasitic fungus developed on the fruit of Zeamays
Dr.But who proved ustilago on himself and others introduced this remedy into homeopathy

Characteristics
(1) It has a special affinity for the generative organs of both sexes. In it produces an atonic conditions

• Special affinity on left ovary and uterus
• Ustilago congests the uterus and produce hemorrhages passive or in clots
• It is in uterine h’ges menstrual, post-par tum and climacteric that ustilago has been powerfully employed
• There can be vicarious menstruation, from lungs and bowels and bleeding between the periods with left infra mammary pain
• Menorrhagia, attended with ovarian irritation
• Hypertrophy of uterus , Uterus feels drawn in to a knot
• Fibroids uterus

Concomitants symptoms

• Vertigo , hot flushes of heat , gone feeling epigastrium, bearing don sensation
• Backache – ( from lip to leg )
• Ovarian dysmenorrhoea, tendency to abortion etc.
• General < during climacteric
• (2) In male generative organs
• Irresistible desire to masturbate
• Emissions, even when talking to a women
• Neuralgia of testicles with constant aching

(3) Acts on skin, hair and nails- loss of hair and nails
(4) Back – Sensation of boiling water flowing along the back.