Well I dont know what happened to my other topic but here we go again....I have a question....the health food store called and said the brown bottles came in...now my question is how do I measure the water or vodka...do I need a special something or do these bottles usually have the measuring thingy inside? Or would you suggest another way of doing it...I want to do this correctly.

What you want is to add sufficent vodka to preserve the solution you are making up. So for a 10% alcoholic solution add 20% by volume. For the Nux vomica prescription fill a 100ml bottle with 50ml of purified or distilled water then add 10ml of vodka. Drop a pill of the remedy into the bottle and there is your re-useable medicinal solution. As for rough measures a teaspoon is taken as 5ml and a tablespoon as 20ml.

[This message has been edited by Frank Hicks (edited 28 April 2000).]

Why doesn't that make any sense to me? You put1/10th alcohol in a 100ml bottle and fill the bottle half way with water. Is that it?

I am not sure where the notion of a 10% solution came from. Frank, I have never known what is an adequate percentage to act as a preservative - is it 10%?

If that is the case then Frank's procedure is just to half fill a 100 ml bottle ie with 50ml water and then to add 10ml (ie 20%) alcohol. That makes sense if the alcohol used is 50% pure alcohol - which I presume to be the percentage for vodka.

I have started using tap water when I make up LMs after a local pharmacist told me that that is what pharmacists use because tap water has less fungus in it than purified, becasuse the purified water soon develops mould as it stands, once opened.

Yes a 10% solution is the minimum for stopping the water going off. In hotter countries a higher percentage might be required, say a 20-25% solution.
Tap water can have a lot of nasties in, hence purified or distilled in preference. As long as all of it is made up into a solution once the seal is broken it holds indefinately.
Hahnemann used a piece of charcoal suspended by a thread as a preservative for those patients 'sensitive' to alcohol.

[This message has been edited by Frank Hicks (edited 28 April 2000).]

[This message has been edited by Frank Hicks (edited 28 April 2000).]

As long as all of it is made up into a solution once the seal is broken it holds indefinately.
Hahnemann used a piece of charcoal suspended by a thread as a preservative for those patients 'sensitive' to alcohol.

Frank, thanks very much for this info. I have avoided prescribing LMs sometimes owing to the water problem. Do you mean tipping vodka into it in the proportions stated as soon as it is opened? Is there any make of vodka that is especially pure?
I like the idea of the charcoal suspended a lot, especially as it's often to children that LMs are given, and they sometimes dislike alcohol.
I wonder if you could kindly let me know where to find this information from Hahnemann, and also if you know that charcoal is as good a preservative as 10%alcohol.
Also, does Hahnemann state that 10% alcohol is strong enough to preserve it indefinitely? Otherwise what source is this from please? I am concerned because I would like to be sure not to poison my patients with water that has gone bad.
Many thanks again for your advice.

I always use distilled water, not bottled water and a brand of grain alcohol called Everclear which is 190 proof. Have never had a solution grow anything with Everclear as the preservative! The reason for the 100 ml bottle is in order to have ample room to succuss vigorously.

David Little has a lot on his web site at www.simillimum.com and www.alchemilla.com has the formulas for LM and water potencies.

Frank, I crush the pellet (between clean white paper) first. Do you think that matters if you wish to use it quite soon after making the solution or is the pellet undisolved OK? Do you "bang" the original solution once upon making it?

Might be the original post is about liquid remedy...tincture, not pellets,since mention is made of a brown bottle?

This thread is getting away from the Gas query so have reposted it seperately.

No more.. butts in here....

[This message has been edited by GM (edited 29 April 2000).]

Hey I could get only a 59ml bottle is that ok?