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Schwabe News Volume 4 | Issue 10-12 | October – December 2013

Anagalis arvensis

It is commonly known as Scarlet pimpernel. This drug has attracted recent attention after research results of its alcohol extract inhibiting herpes and poliomyelitis virus, and presence of antifungal activities were known.    In India, the Central Council for Research in Homoeopathy had found its action against Ranikhet virus.  Experiments on animals exhibited uterine stimulation and estrogenic activity.¹

Anagalis arvensis is a common plant found all over in India, but originally a native of Europe.  With rich range of phytochemicals 0.1% alkaloids, n-Hexacosane, stigmasterol, lacceric acid, anagalin, anagalligenin, glucoside A & B, arabinose, xylose, a-spinasterol-3-glucoside, kaempferol, quercetin and rutin from flowers, it is a potentially important drug.  More compounds have been identified recently i.e. Arvenin-I and Arvenin- II and a range of cucurbitacins.⁴

In homoeopathy, it was introduced as back as 1846 by Dr. Schreter.  A tincture is made out of the whole plant in approx. 60% alcohol.² It is recommended for skin with itching and tingling, tissue softening, destroyal of warts, and with mental like hilarity and hydrophobias.  It also covers pains of facial muscles, of rheumatic origin in shoulder, arm, and cramp like pains in thumbs and fingers.³

It is also employed as an antidote to animal poisons and to prevent injurious effects from the bites of rabid animals.  It is useful in headache when it is confined to the supraorbital region and is attended with rumbling in the bowels and eructation.  In diseases of the skin it is of service for itching of the fingers and palms, which may be covered with eczema-like eruptions.⁵

At homoeopathic higher levels, it is a remedy for hypochondriasis, mania, epilepsy, cataract, spots on the cornea, hepatitis, visceral obstruction, inflammation of rectum, hemorrhoids, kidneys problems, copious urination, gravel, gout, syphilis with deranged mind, nosebleed, pain in small of back, gonorrhoea, cancer of mammae, sterility, lumbago, bloody sweat, ill-conditioned ulcers characterised by great tickling and itching and neuralgic pains of right check bones; rheumatic pains in left shoulder to neck  and in muscles of upper arm or the arm while writing.⁶

Recommended dose: Mother tincture, 10-20 drops thrice daily.

References:

1. Glossary of Indian Medicinal Plants with Active Principles, Part 1 (A-K), Publication and Information Directorate, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi, 1992.
2. Homoeopathic Pharmacopoeia of the United States, Southeastern, PA, Homeopathic Pharmacopeia Convention of the United States (available by subscription at http://www.hpus.com/).
3. W. Boericke, New Manual of Homoeopathic Materia Medica & Repertory [with Relationship of Remedies], Second Re-Augmented & Revised Edition Based on Ninth Edition, Reprint Edition 2002, B. Jain Publishers, New Delhi.
4. CSIR, Second Supplement to Glossary of Indian Medicinal Plants with Active Principles, Part 1 (A-K), Publication and Information Directorate, Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, New Delhi, 1992.
5. A. L. Blackwood, A Manual of Materia Medica, Therapeutics and Pharmacology, Reprint Edition 1995, B. Jain Publishers, New Delhi.

• E. P. Anshutz, New, Old and Forgotten Remedies, 2nd Edition, RadarOpus 1.33, Archibel S.A. Rue Fontaine St. Pierre 1E, Zoning Industriel de la Fagne, 5330 Assesse, Belgium.