Epilepsy : Nervous system disorders

Dragon's bones (Os Draconic) are fossil mammal bones that are used in Chinese medicine to treat various nervous problems including palpitation, insomnia and neurosis. Such bones consist largely of calcium carbonate and calcium phosphate. They are powdered and taken with water.

Gypsum (Gypsum Fibrosum), hydrated calcium sulphate, is used to treat muscle spasms. This mineral is added to water, which then is boiled. The resulting liquid is prescribed as a treatment for spasms that are accompanied by fever and indicative of infection of the nervous system.

Powdered alum (Alumen) is prescribed to control epilepsy. Long (1962), for example, has described its use in the treatment of five cases of this disorder. In this clinical experiment the twice daily dose varied between 3 and 4.5 grams. If the patient had suffered from epilepsy for one to two months the course of treatment lasted 20 days; if attacks had occurred for longer than this but less than a year, the drug was taken for one month. If the patient had suffered from epilepsy for more than a year, treatment was continued for some three months. A followup survey, conducted after a minimum of four months and a maximum of three years after alum treatment, established that none of the epileptics had suffered repeat attacks.

Alum is not the only stone drug to be used in the treatment of epilepsy, both amber (Succinum) and borax (Borax) are used also for this purpose. To illustrate, in a paper published in 1975, researchers from Tangshan hospital, Hebei province reported on the value of powdered borax in the control of this disorder in 65 patients. The dose prescribed depended upon the frequency and type of seizure involved. Children were given one half the borax prescribed for adults. When the latter suffered from grand mal, or very frequent petit mal attacks, they were provided with 1 gram of powdered borax, three times a day. Those adult patients who suffered less frequent petit mal attacks received 0.7 grams, on three occasions daily. If only rare epileptic attacks occurred, 0.3 grams of powdered borax was given three times each day. In addition, some patients also took herbal formulae, designed to tranquillize and to relieve muscle spasms. If improvement was noted, the treatment with borax continued for a further six months.

The Tangshan hospital researchers reported that, after one year, 12 patients appeared cured, that is they had had no seizures for at least six months. A further 19 cases showed a significant decline in the frequency with which they suffered epileptic attacks, while 22 more showed some improvement. That is 81.5 per cent of patients appeared to have benefited from borax treatment. Only 12 cases did not gain any relief from the use of this stone drug. Despite the fact that almost all patients had taken borax continuously for one year, no adverse side effects had been recorded.