Jaborandi
Made from the jaborandi leaf — the Amazonian plant whose pilocarpine is a genuine modern drug of the eye and the salivary glands, and the classical remedy of the excessive secretion.
The whole picture, in one breath
Think of every gland flowing at once: profuse sweat, streaming saliva, nausea and vomiting with the secretions, a constant need to urinate, and the books' great picture of excessive secretion in the hot, sweating constitution. The all-glands-flowing remedy: that is Jaborandi.
The substance, in plain words
Jaborandi is the Amazonian shrub whose leaves carry pilocarpine — a genuine, enduring modern drug: the eye drops that treat glaucoma by draining the eye's fluid, and the tablets that relieve the dry mouth of radiation therapy, used daily in hospitals worldwide. The proving gave the remedy the secretion portrait.
The traditional picture Classical sources
The inner state
- Anxiety with the secretions. Worry and restlessness with the sweating and sickness, worse at night.
- Irritability. Cross, worse from heat and from contradiction.
- Dullness. Heavy mind with the profuse losses.
The body
- Profuse sweat. The keynote: drenching perspiration — the books' great sweating remedy beside the others.
- Excessive salivation. Streaming saliva with nausea — the mouth waters and the stomach turns.
- Constant nausea and vomiting. The secretions ride the vomiting; the stomach empties again and again.
- Frequent urination. The bladder joins the flow — the books record the copious urine.
- Hot flushes. Surges of heat with the sweat — the menopausal shading of the books.
- Worse heat and damp. Warmth and wet weather thicken every secretion.
Modalities (worse and better factors)
| Worse from ⬇ | Better from ⬇ |
|---|---|
| heat and warm rooms; damp cold; exertion; night. | cool open air; rest; moderate temperature. |
Where it acts (organ affinities)
Sweat glands, salivary glands, stomach, bladder, general secretion.
Where the classical picture comes from
The Amazonian leaf's proving gave the all-glands-flowing portrait; the old books used Jaborandi wherever the secretions ran excessive — sweat, saliva, urine together — and the clinical chemistry agreed.
The substance in real medicine Pharmacology
What this section is: the pharmacology and toxicology of the source substance. It is not clinical evidence that a homeopathic preparation of it treats any condition. What controlled trials do and do not show is set out on the Evidence page.
Pilocarpine is genuinely one of pharmacology's most durable alkaloids: isolated from jaborandi in the 1870s, it remains a first-line glaucoma drug in every eye clinic and the standard treatment for dry mouth after head-and-neck radiation — a real, daily, life-improving medicine, a century and a half old. The plant's secretion chemistry is the drug the proving described.
Look-alikes (how the classical authors told it apart)
| Remedy | Looks similar because… | Tells it apart because… |
|---|---|---|
| Mercurius solubilis | Salivation and sweating | Mercurius is sweaty, foul and trembling at night; Jaborandi flows all glands in the heat. |
| Kali iodatum | Hot profuse sweat | Kali-iod sweats hot with wandering bone pains; Jaborandi with the nausea and salivation. |
| Tabacum | Secretions and nausea | Tabacum is the deathly-pale seasick state; Jaborandi the flowing, hot one. |
| Gelsemium sempervirens | Sweat of the drowsy | Gelsemium sweats in the drowsy, heavy fever; Jaborandi in the hot flowing state. |