Lemon Juice as Liniment for Neuralgia

“Cut a lemon in two and squeeze juice on parts afflicted and rub in, then place hot cloths over it. I know this will cure the pain.” This is very good.

Source: Mother’s Remedies: Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remidies from Mothers of the United States and Canada, T. J. Ritter

Pain, Vinegar and Pepper for

“Hot flannel cloths wrung from vinegar, to which a pinch of cayenne pepper has been added, applied hot to any part of the body, will relieve pain.” This is very good. This remedy is always at hand and can be prepared quickly. It will most always give relief.

Source: Mother’s Remedies: Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remidies from Mothers of the United States and Canada, T. J. Ritter

Ingredients: Feverfew

The Feverfew is one of the wild Chamomiles (Pyrethrum Parthenium), or Matricaria, so called because especially useful for motherhood. Its botanical names come from the Latin febrifugus, putting fever to flight, and parthenos, a virgin. The herb is a Composite plant, and grows in every hedgerow, with numerous small heads of yellow flowers, having outermost white rays, but with an upright stem; whereas that of the true garden Chamomile is procumbent. The whole plant has a pungent odour, and is particularly disliked by bees. A double variety is cultivated in gardens for ornamental purposes.

The herb Feverfew is strengthening to the stomach, preventing hysteria and promoting the monthly functions of women. It is much used by country mediciners, though insufficiently esteemed by the doctors of to-day.

In Devonshire the plant is known as “Bachelor’s buttons,” and at Torquay as “Flirtwort,” being also sometimes spoken of as “Feathyfew,” or “Featherfull.”

Gerard says it may be used both in drinks, and bound on the wrists, as of singular virtue against the ague.

As “Feverfue,” it was ordered, by the Magi of old, “to be pulled from the ground with the left hand, and the fevered patient’s name must be spoken forth, and the herbarist must not look behind him.” Country persons have long been accustomed to make curative uses of this herb very commonly, which grows abundantly throughout England. Its leaves are feathery and of a delicate green colour, being conspicuous even in mid-winter. Chemically, the Feverfew furnishes a blue volatile oil; containing a camphoraceous stearopten, and a liquid hydrocarbon, together with some tannin, and a bitter mucilage.

The essential oil is medicinally useful for correcting female irregularities, as well as for obviating cold indigestion. The herb is also known as “Maydeweed,” because useful against hysterical distempers, to which young women are subject. Taken generally it is a positive tonic to the digestive and nervous systems. Our chemists make a medicinal tincture of Feverfew, the dose of which is from ten to twenty drops, with a spoonful of water, three times a day. This tincture, if dabbed oil the parts with a small sponge, will immediately relieve the pain and swelling caused by bites of insects or vermin. In the official guide to Switzerland directions are given
to take “a little powder of the plant called Pyrethrum roseum and make it into a paste with a few drops of spirit, then apply this to the hands and face, or any exposed part of the body, and let it dry: no mosquito or fly will then touch you.” Or if two teaspoonfuls of the tincture are mixed with half a pint of cold water, and if all parts of the body likely to be exposed to the bites of insects are freely sponged therewith they will remain unassailed. Feverfew is manifestly the progenitor of the true Chamomilla (Anthemis nobilis), from which the highly useful Camomile “blows,” so commonly employed in domestic medicine, are obtained, and its flowers, when dried, may be applied to the same purposes. An infusion of them made with boiling water and allowed to become cold, will allay any distressing sensitiveness to pain in a highly nervous subject, and will afford relief to the faceache or earache of a dyspeptic or rheumatic person. This Feverfew (Chrysanthemum parthenium), is best calculated to pacify those who are liable to sudden, spiteful, rude irascibility, of which they are conscious, but say they cannot help it, and to soothe fretful children. “Better is a dinner or such herbs, where love is; than a stalled ox, and hatred therewith.”

Source: Herbal Simples Approved for Modern Uses of Cure, William Thomas Fernie

News: ‘Let Me Take Your Pain Away’ in Iran

“What Are the Traditional and Modern Remedies for Pain Relief in Iran?

“Dardat be joonem,” the saying goes in Iran — let me take away your pain.

It’s more often said between family and friends, but the phrase isn’t far from the work of Dr. Mohammad Sharify, head of the Iranian Pain Society.”

Full story: ABC News, 20th February 2008

News: Crazy or Brilliant? Home Remedies for Pain

“Right now — in bathrooms, bedrooms or at the kitchen sink — people across the world are trying rather unusual home remedies to cure their pain.

In Mexico, some people rub potato halves on their foreheads for headaches. In Central America, blowing cigar smoke on a sufferer’s back is believed to bring them pain relief. And in the United States, rubbing cobwebs into cuts is believed to stop bleeding and pain.”

Full story: ABC News, 29th January 2008

For Rheumatism, Lumbago, Pains, Bruises and Bites of Insects

One raw egg, well beaten; half a pint of vinegar; one ounce of spirits of turpentine; a quarter of an ounce of spirits of wine; a quarter of an ounce of camphor. These ingredients to be beaten well together, then put in a bottle and shaken for ten minutes, after which, to be corked down tightly to exclude the air. In half an hour it is fit for use.

Directions: To be well rubbed in, two, three or four times a day. For rheumatism in the head, to be rubbed at the back of the neck and behind the ears.

Source: Enquire Within Upon Everything.

Definition: Anodyne

Anodynes are those medicines which relieve pain by blunting the sensibility of the nerves, or of the brain, so that it does not appreciate the morbid sensation. An anodyne may be a stimulant in one dose, and a narcotic in a larger one. The properties of different anodyne agents vary, consequently they produce unlike effects. The size of the dose required, differs according to circumstances and condition. An adult, suffering acute pain, requires a much larger dose to produce an anodyne effect than one who is a chronic sufferer. An individual accustomed to the use of anodynes, requires a much larger dose to procure relief than one who is not. Doses may be repeated, until their characteristic effects are produced, after an interval of thirty or forty minutes. When the stomach is very sensitive and will not tolerate their internal administration, one-sixth of a grain of Morphia can be inserted beneath the skin, by means of a hypodermic syringe. Relief is more quickly experienced, and the anodyne effect is much more lasting than when taken into the stomach.

Source: The People’s Common Sense Medical Adviser in Plain English or, Medicine Simplified, R.V. Pierce.

Definition: Fomentation, Poultice

Fomentation, Poultice: A warm, moist substance applied to the body (sometimes with compression) to relieve pain or inflammation.