Excerpted from the Therapeutic Gazette, July 15, 1889, p. 483
BELLADONNA AND CANNABIS INDICA. – USE OF PER RECTUM IN GYNAECOLOGICAL PRACTICE
In the Boston Med. and Surg. Journal, May 23, 1889, Dr. J. W. Farlow calls attention to the value of employing the absorbing power of the rectum in different affections of the pelvic organs… The remedies to which he especially refers as used in this manner are belladonna and cannabis indica.
He states that belladonna has a sedative action on the uterus and pelvic contents, and relaxes rather than constipates the bowels. Its value in irritable conditions of the bladder and urethra is well known. This combination of qualities is called for in a very large number of women.
Cannabis indica has somewhat similar properties, and especially for sensitive ovaries, and in the various painful affections of those organs its use is often productive of much good. It has few equals in its power over nervous headaches such as women with pelvic trouble are subject to.
About the age of puberty there is frequent complaint of painful menstruation with pelvic and general excitement, and often weakness from this after the flow has entirely ceased. Frequent micturation and headache are also very common at this time. If the excitement can be moderated, if the pelvic organs can be made less irritable, there will be less pain, less hemorrhage, less weakness, and consequently a much longer period of health between the catamenia. This Dr. Farlow believes may be accomplished through the rectal use of belladonna and cannabis indica, beginning a few days before the menstrual symptoms appear. So, also, tenderness of the ovaries, and various symptoms which accompany the menopause, are often relieved by the same mode of treatment.
