Leaves of Eucalyptus globulus Labillardiére (Nat. Ord. Myrtaceae).

Preparations

Tinctura Eucalypti. (Not official.) Tincture of eucalyptus. Dose, 3 ss— 3 ij.

Extractum Eucalypti Fluidum

Fluid extract of eucalyptus. Dose, τη x— 3 j.

Oleum Eucalypti

Dose, τη v— 3 ss. Usually prescribed in capsules, but may be given in the form of emulsion.

Composition

Eucalyptus contains a peculiar resin composed of three different resinous bodies, a volatile oil consisting of eucalyptol, terpene, and cymol, tannic acid, and a crystallizable fatty acid. Eucalyptol is the most important of the constituents, and is now official.

Antagonists and Incompatibles

Alkalies, the mineral acids, the salts of iron, mercury, lead, zinc, etc., are chemically incompatible. All agents promoting waste, or the retrograde metamorphosis of tissue, are therapeutically incompatible.

Synergists

The simple and aromatic bitters, hydrastis, cinchona, etc., camphor, turpentine, cubebs, copaiba, the essential oils and substances containing them, are synergistic to or promote the therapeutical actions of eucalyptus. Any of these remedies may, therefore, be prescribed in the same formula with eucalyptus.

Physiological Actions

Eucalyptus has a warm, aromatic, bitter, and camphoraceous taste, resembling somewhat the taste of cubebs. In the mouth it excites the flow of saliva, and leaves a hot, pungent, and rather disagreeable flavor. In the stomach it causes a sensation of warmth, and doubtless promotes the flow of gastric juice. The appetite and digestive power are increased under its use. Increased intestinal secretion, also, is one result of its administration, and hence the alvine evacuations are rendered somewhat more copious and easy. In very large doses it causes a sense of weight and uneasiness at the epigastrium, odorous eructations and indigestion, followed by diarrhoea, the stools having the characteristic odor of eucalyptol. The essential oil is readily diffusible and enters the blood with facility, but what changes, if any, it induces in the blood are unknown. It increases the action of the heart, lowers the arterial tension, and induces a feverish state. The respiratory movements are accelerated. Wakefulness is caused by it in those of full health, and sleep in the weak and anaemic. The eucalyptol is eliminated by the skin, mucous membrane of the bronchial tubes, and by the kidneys, the secretions of these organs being increased by it, and they are impregnated with its odor. This is especially the case with the urine, which, after some days' administration, becomes most strongly odorous by the presence of eucalyptol.

The vapor of eucalyptus, inhaled in large quantity, produces analogous effects to the internal administration, besides the more decided effects on the bronchial mucous membrane.

Eucalyptus is a powerful diaphoretic.

Therapy

The decoction of the leaves is an efficient local application in the various forms of stomatitis, angina subacute and chronic, and tonsillitis after the subsidence of the acute stage.

Eucalyptus is one of the most useful of the so-called stomachics in atonic dyspepsia, chronic gastric catarrh, and chronic intestinal catarrh, but its use is contraindicated in inflammatory states. The form of vomiting and indigestion dependent on the presence of sarcina is relieved by this agent, which acts by destroying the vitality of this minute organism. That condition of the mucous membrane which favors the production of intestinal parasites is removed by eucalyptus. In the case of ascarides vermiculares, the remedy should be used by injection.

Like the bitters, eucalyptus may be used to promote constructive metamorphosis, but it possesses more decided stimulant effects than these agents, by virtue of the eucalyptol. In convalescence from acute disease, in debility arising from defective assimilation, and in cachectic states generally, it is a serviceable tonic and stimulant. When the action of the heart is weak, it may be strengthened by eucalyptus. To women at the change of life who suffer from flatulence, palpitation of the heart, and sudden flushings of the face, it affords great relief, and often permanently removes these symptoms.

Hysteria, chorea, asthma, and allied nervous states, when occurring in debilitated subjects, and cerebral anaemia, are benefited by eucalyptus. In asthma eucalyptus may be smoked in cigarettes with stramonium, belladonna, tobacco, etc. Its efficacy in the form of fumes is strongly stated by Maclean.

The most important uses of this agent occur in the treatment of catarrhal affections of the broncho-pulmonary mucous membrane. It is not adapted to acute affections or to recent inflammation, but to chronic cases accompanied by free muco-purulent expectoration. The author is able to confirm the observations of Gubler in reference to the great utility of eucalyptus in bronchorrhoea. It is an interesting fact, and probably explanatory of its therapeutical action, that eucalyptol is in part eliminated by the bronchial mucous membranes. In the same way eucalyptus is effective in the treatment of catarrhal states of the genito-urinary organs. Chronic desquamative nephritis, granular degeneration of the kidneys, pyelonephritis, and hydronephrosis, are improved by its cautious administration, but it should not be forgotten that, used too freely, or for too great a length of time, it will cause irritation and congestion of the kidneys, in the same way that turpentine, copaiba, and cubebs do.

No remedy which the author has hitherto used has seemed to him so effective in chronic catarrh of the bladder as eucalyptus. The urine during its administration acquires a strong odor of eucalyptol, and to its local action on the mucous membrane is to be attributed the therapeutical effect.

Eucalyptus has been much praised as a remedy for intermittent fever. The evidence as to its utility is contradictory. As the result of his own observations, and after careful examination of the facts reported by others, the author concludes that eucalyptus is far inferior to quinine. It is certainly very serviceable in the convalescence from intermittent and remittent fevers, and in chronic malarial poisoning it has a high degree of utility. It can not take the place of quinine for the arrest of the paroxysms, or to prevent relapses at the septenary periods, but it is more useful than quinine to reconstruct the damages in the organs of assimilation caused by malarial infection.

Externally, the tincture and the distilled water of eucalyptus are used as disinfectant applications to foul-smelling and ill-conditioned ulcers and wounds (Gimbert). The water of eucalyptus is recommended by Gubler as a vehicle for agents used by the hypodermatic method. The toxic influence of eucalyptus on the lower forms of life —cryptogamic and infusorial organisms—is the ground of its application for these purposes. As respects solutions of alkaloids for hypodermatic use, the water of eucalyptus prevents the development of the penicillium, which grows rapidly and at the expense of the alkaloid in solutions prepared with simple distilled water.

Authorities referred to:

Burdel, Dr. E. Bulletin de Thérapeutique, tome lxxxiv, p. 409, et ibid., tome lxxxv, p. 529.

Costau, M. Gazette Hebdomadaire, 1872, No. 25. Bulletin de Thérapeutique, tome lxxxiii, p. 237.

Gimbert, M. le Dr. Bulletin de Thérapeutique, tome lxxxii, p. 422

Gubler, Dr. A. Bulletin de Thérapeutique, tome lxxxi, pp. 145, 193.

Keller, Dr. The British Medical Journal, May 11, 1872.

Lorinser, Dr. Wiener medicinische Wochen&chrift, 1869, xix, 43.

Maclean, Dr. M. C. The Practitioner, vol. vii, p. 268.

Schmidt's Jahrbucher der gesammten Medicin, vol. cxlviii, p. 11. Ueber Eucalyptus globulus; nach F. W. Lorinser; C. Haller; Franz Seitz; L. A. Buchner; C. Paul; A. Gubler.

Ibid. Vol. cl, p. 121. Ueber den JVutzen des Eucalyptus gegen Wechselfieber.