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Non-Homeopathic Belladonna

BillyJoe said:
Because, the underlying cause of the seizures which have been occuring for three months since the infant's birth and had been occuring at a rate of one seizure every twenty minutes before the Belladonna/Atropine was administered, would need to have spontaneously resolved over the duration of action of a single dose of Belladonna/Atropine (? eight hours).

How likely is that?
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Billy Joe, there may be hope for you. ;)
 
Rodney said:
Are you referring to Dr. Wesley Ketchum? He did know Cayce at the time of the Tommy House case, but -- as far as I can tell -- had no involvement in it. And bear in mind that Ketchum was a homeopath, and so I doubt if he would have told Cayce to give Tommy a measured dose of belladonna. Also, the Aime Dietrich case occurred prior to Ketchum meeting Cayce.
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I was speaking to my statement that Cayce likely helped some people. I don't know whether or not that includes Tommy. And I was thinking also of Layne (Osteopath) and Blackburn (MD) who assisted him before Ketchum.

Linda
 
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BillyJoe said:
Because, the underlying cause of the seizures which have been occuring for three months since the infant's birth and had been occuring at a rate of one seizure every twenty minutes before the Belladonna/Atropine was administered, would need to have spontaneously resolved over the duration of action of a single dose of Belladonna/Atropine (? eight hours).

How likely is that?
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From the manuals I got the idea that it was more like eight days than eight hours. You can't really tell from the information given, but yes, their idea of medical treatment in the 18th century was to put an infant in a coma for eight days.
 
Rodney said:
I'm not saying it's proof of supernatural intervention, but you haven't convinced me that someone with some basic nineteenth century medical knowledge would have prescribed belladonna for Tommy. If that was the case, why didn't any of the three doctors there prescribe it? According to "An American Prophet" (p. 6), the doctors thought Cayce's recommendation was "tantamount to murder." In fact, the book quotes Dr. Jackson, a general practitioner from Hopkinsville, Ky, as stating: "You'll kill little Tommy for sure."


Again, it wasn't just Dr. House, but two other doctors as well. And where did Cayce get that, or any other, medical knowledge?


Cayce didn't write any books about his cases, but many others have. However, I'm in total agreement about discussing his other cases. Did someone say Aime Dietrich? ;) See post #67 of this thread: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=62560&page=2&highlight=aime+dietrich
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Well, if we assume that all those details are correct (and I don't think that this is proven by any means) then I would assume that the three doctors no longer believed in prescribing belladonna because atropine was available, and they no longer believed in knocking an infant into a coma to stop seizures because other treatments were available and they simply didn't know how much belladonna you can give a baby before you kill it.

Cayce was recommending an out of date treatment. 1909 was the twentieth century. I guess I didn't make that clear in my other posts, for which I apologize. Cayce may have known more about herbal belladonna than the actual doctors.
 
ChristineR said:
From the manuals I got the idea that it was more like eight days than eight hours. You can't really tell from the information given, but yes, their idea of medical treatment in the 18th century was to put an infant in a coma for eight days.
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I must have missed that.
I thought he was given a single dose of Belladonna. I assume more than a single dose would be required to keep him in a coma for eight days.

I wonder if Rodney has any details on this point?
 
BillyJoe said:
I must have missed that.
I thought he was given a single dose of Belladonna. I assume more than a single dose would be required to keep him in a coma for eight days.

I wonder if Rodney has any details on this point?
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What I got from the manuals was that the standard practice was to give the patient very small amounts of the drug until he passed out, at which time he might remain in a stupor for days. The effect was more profound in children.

The most straightforward reading of Rodney's quote doesn't match up with this, but if your working assumption is that Cayce was prescribing a reasonable folk remedy that might have worked for certain conditions you can then stretch the meaning of "measured dose" a little to get the standard dosing and the expected outcome.
 
ChristineR said:
What I got from the manuals was that the standard practice was to give the patient very small amounts of the drug until he passed out, at which time he might remain in a stupor for days. The effect was more profound in children.

The most straightforward reading of Rodney's quote doesn't match up with this, but if your working assumption is that Cayce was prescribing a reasonable folk remedy that might have worked for certain conditions you can then stretch the meaning of "measured dose" a little to get the standard dosing and the expected outcome.
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"An American Prophet" at p. 8 states:

"Medical records do not exist to describe the child's physiological reaction to the [single measured dose of] belladonna, or to the steaming hot towels dipped in peach-tree solution in which the naked child was immediately wrapped. All that is known is that the crying stopped as soon as the mother spooned the poison into her child's mouth, and that he fell into his first deep and uninterrupted sleep since birth. Thomas House Jr. awoke hours later, drenched in sweat, cheeks pink, and breathing steadily. He was never to have a convulsion again."
 
Christine,



Rodney said:
"An American Prophet" at p. 8 states:

"Medical records do not exist to describe the child's physiological reaction to the [single measured dose of] belladonna, or to the steaming hot towels dipped in peach-tree solution in which the naked child was immediately wrapped. All that is known is that the crying stopped as soon as the mother spooned the poison into her child's mouth, and that he fell into his first deep and uninterrupted sleep since birth. Thomas House awoke hours later...He was never to have a convulsion again."
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From the bolded bit, we can conclude, assuming the story is true, that it all happened in a matter of hours after a single dose of Belladonna/Atropine.

So my question stands: How likely is that?

(Also note the italisised bit: The Belladonna started working as soon as it entered the child's mouth - before it was even absorbed!)

regards,
BillyJoe
 
BillyJoe said:
that it all happened in a matter of hours after a single dose of Belladonna/Atropine.

So my question stands: How likely is that?

(Also note the italisised bit: The Belladonna started working as soon as it entered the child's mouth - before it was even absorbed!)
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Another incredible detail:
...to the steaming hot towels dipped in peach-tree solution in which the naked child was immediately wrapped. ...Thomas House Jr. awoke hours later, drenched in sweat,
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So, how did this wet child wake up in a sweat? How would they know it was sweat instead of peach-tree tea? I smell a rat.
 
I suppose in 5 pages this has been brought up but the neurological effect of belladonna is essentially an anticholinergic response.

It could have an effect on seizures by interfering with neurotransmitters in the brain.

OTOH, any medical anecdote which lacks sufficient documentation allows limited conclusions to be drawn. We really don't know anything except this is the story related about the event. So what's the point?
 
BillyJoe said:
*snip*
(Also note the italisised bit: The Belladonna started working as soon as it entered the child's mouth - before it was even absorbed!)

regards,
BillyJoe
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Yeah, assuming the account is accurate (but we cannot assume that), it definitely rules out the belladonna as the primary cause.

Or, we can infer that the account is inaccurate, in which case it is rather ininteresting.

Hans
 
MRC_Hans said:
Yeah, assuming the account is accurate (but we cannot assume that), it definitely rules out the belladonna as the primary cause....Or, we can infer that the account is inaccurate, in which case it is rather ininteresting.
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That has been my point from the start.
There is no explanation for what happened whatever way you look at it.
The problem must be the story.
Lacking strong documentation, we must dismiss the story out of hand.
 
BillyJoe said:
Lacking strong documentation, we must dismiss the story out of hand.
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It's not so much the lack of documentation as the lack of information. There just isn't enough information to figure out what happened. We don't know what was causing the siezures, we don't know how much belladonna he was given. It would be nice to know whether there are any contemporaneous sources for the story related by Kirkpatrick, but without further details it's worthless as far as figuring out whether or not Cayce cured Tommy is concerned.
 
Bottom line is you can speculate about Jesus' walking on water all you want, unless we can travel backward in time, you can't draw any conclusions.
 
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