DIABETIC EMERGENCY—EXTREMELY HIGH BLOOD SUGAR
HOW HOMEOPATHY BROUGHT IT DOWN
High blood glucose (sugar) is the hallmark of diabetes. When it goes very, very high the patient can go into coma. It is a medical emergency. I once had a patient with extremely high blood glucose and, at the time, neither he nor I knew it. I treated him for something else and not only did that complaint go away his extremely high blood glucose also dropped.
It happened this way. On June, 30, 1997, a 36 year old man came in complaining of nausea, headache, vague dizziness, flank pain and stomach pain. It could have been a virus—and probably was.
As I was taking his case, he said, “You know, there’s diabetes in my family and I was wondering if I could have it?”
He was drinking a lot—six to seven liters of water a day for the past few weeks—and diabetics often have great thirst. But, since he was also not especially hungry, and diabetics often are, I thought it not probable. But, just to be sure, I drew blood and sent it off to the lab.
He had a smorgasbord of symptoms:
Dry mouth despite drinking so much water.
Cramping in the calves.
Nausea in the morning, worse after eating.
Flank pain.
Right-sided head and neck pains.
Feeling over-heated.
Pains in the stomach and liver which felt, “Like a bubble, like it will burst.”
Tongue coated white.
Some dizziness on rising from sitting.
I examined him. Blood pressure was normal at 124/82. Heart rate a bit fast at 104/minute. The area over the stomach was tender to the pressure of my hand as was the liver area. The abdomen was mildly distended.
My working diagnosis: a virus affecting the gastrointestinal tract primarily. Though he was uncomfortable, he was in no acute distress that I could discern.
Striking, was the large volume of water he was drinking—an estimated six to seven liters per day, in spite of which his mouth was dry. The upper abdomen in the area of the stomach and liver were quite sensitive and felt very full, as though bursting. This latter symptom got my attention. It seemed almost as important as his extreme thirst and being overheated.
Despite feeling ill, he had continued to work as a car salesman which involved walking all over a large car lot.
He casually mentioned the best time of day was the evening. When asked why, he said it was because he could then sit down. From that I deduced he was worse from being up and about and better at rest. His question about diabetes suggested an anxiety about health.
I searched the Repertory, a large volume with thousands of symptoms, and came up with the following:
MIND: anxiety about health
VERTIGO: worse on rising
HEAD, Pain, localizing to the right side
MOUTH: dryness with thirst
MOUTH: white discoloration of the tongue
STOMACH: thirst for large quantities often
STOMACH: sensation of fullness
STOMACH: distension
STOMACH: nausea after eating
STOMACH: nausea, worse from walking
STOMACH: nausea, worse in the morning on rising
EXTREMITIES: cramps of the calf worse at night
GENERALS: worse becoming heated
The above repertorization indicated the homeopathic medicine, Bryonia, which was given. I told him to repeat it in eight hours.
The next day, July 1st, his wife telephoned early. Her husband was worse, she said. Sometimes with homeopathic treatment, the patient can feel worse before feeling better. I was confident of my prescription of Bryonia and told her to repeat it.
As soon as I put down the phone, the lab called with the news his blood sugar from the day before was 850 mg./dL, triglycerides 2,510 mg/dL, and cholesterol 270 mg/dL. These were frightening numbers. Normal blood glucose is 85 to 95 mg/dL. Normal for triglycerides is below 150 mg/dL. Cholesterol should be below 200 mg/dL.
In a state of borderline panic, I reasoned that if his blood sugar had been 850 mg/dL 24 hours ago, it could easily be higher now. I had visions of my patient going into diabetic coma.
I called him and told him immediately to go to a hospital emergency room where I assumed he would be admitted and certainly started on insulin.
That evening I telephoned again. His wife answered and said they had spent most of the day in an Emergency Room and were now back home.
“What happened?”
“They gave him Glucotrol 5 mg. (an oral hypoglycemic) to take once a day,” she said.
I was incredulous. Such a low dose of Glucotrol suggested mild diabetes.
“What about his blood sugar?” I wanted to know.
“They said it was 319,” she said.
I was stunned. I could draw but one conclusion: Bryonia had acted and caused a 520 point fall in his blood sugar within 24-30 hours. I told them to discontinue Glucotrol (he took only one dose).
2 July 97:
His thirst was now normal. Urination also normal. It had been copious which I had attributed originally to his large fluid intake (before I knew he had diabetes). He had slept well. Mouth less dry. No cramps in calves. Nausea continued. Only slight stomach tenderness. No headache. Heat in his body came and went whereas before it was constant.
He was placed on a zero carbohydrate diet and told to continue Bryonia twice daily.
7 July 07
Fasting blood sugar (FBS) was now 155 mg/dL. He and his wife decided he should take vanadyl sulfate, a natural supplement sometimes useful in high blood glucose. That together with a strict low carbohydrate diet caused the blood sugars to fall to 90 mg/dL by mid-September, according to measurements at home on his Glucometer Elite (brand).
19 Sept 97
FBS: 123 mg/dL., Triglycerides: 283 mg/dL, Cholesterol: 183 mg/dL, HDL cholesterol 26 mg/dL, LDL cholesterol: 100 mg/dL. Coronary Heart Disease (CHD) risk: 7.04. Serum insulin < 3f.
This case was presented in a slightly different format in the American Journal of Homeopathy, a journal for medical doctors who practice homeopathy.
It recounts a dramatic drop in blood glucose using a homeopathic medicine and may be the first time a homeopathic medicine has been documented to have a dramatic, hypoglycemic effect in an uncontrolled diabetic patient.
It is well known that infections cause blood glucose to rise rapidly in diabetic patients and, presumably, that was the case here. There is no hard evidence that Bryonia affected his chronic diabetic condition. Presumably, Bryonia was homeopathic to his various viral symptoms and by curing them, the pancreas was beneficially affected and his blood sugar fell as a result. Clearly, diet, and perhaps the vanadyl sulfate, proved beneficial in controlling the diabetes. And, possibly, Bryonia.