Dropsy:

Due to failure of capillary action the watery portion of the blood passes out through the walls of the capillaries (fine tubes connecting arteries and veins) and collects in various parts of the body, causing swelling.

Causes: Disorder of blood, spleen and liver enlargement, listless living, taking arsenic, final stages of chronic diarrhea or heart disease or disordered gall bladder.

Symptoms: Soft swellings depressible with the finger, bad taste, thirst, roughness and dryness of skin, red and scanty urine, swellings hot to the touch, swollen veins, temperature, headache, loss of appetite, diarrhea or constipation, cough. If the dropsy is due to heart disease, it appears first on knees and arms. If its source is the spleen or liver, it begins with the stomach. And if listless living is the cause, the feet are first attacked.

Treatment: Sothkalanal Ras, Barisosan Ras, Sothari Mandur, Punarnabasab etc. Where there is swelling on head, feet, or face with fever, breathing difficulty, cough, spleen and liver enlargement, loss of appetite, or diarrhea, the best medicine is Sothkalanal Ras taken with honey and hygrophila spinosa juice. Punarnabasab may be added to facilitate the treatment. Do not worry if side-ailments appear.

Cure the dropsy and these will disappear. If there is constipation, give Punarnabadi Churna or Sothari Churna, and Punarnabasab with bel leaf juice and honey. Where there is cough, give Tarunananda Ras or Chandramrita Ras with betel leaf juice and honey. Barisosan Ras is an excellent remedy, especially in chronic cases when it is used conjunctively with Punarnabasab. Rub the whole body with Suskamuladya Taila if the patient has appetite and no diarrhea, breathing difficulty, or cough.

Diet: Light food as in fever when the case is acute. In chronic dropsy, give substantial diet. Bread is preferred if there is no diarrhea. Aram gruel is the best food. Drinking of water and eating of salt are to be avoided. Hot water bathing is permitted. As the patient improves, feed him rice ( old stock), mugh or musuri lentil soup, meat soup, maringa stick, arum, trichosanthes dioica, eggplant, hog-weed, beans, karala, tender portion of rattan plant, azadirachta leaves, figs, flower of banana, green banana, sing fish, magur fish, bitter and stomachic foods. No vegetables can compare with arum and hog-weed.