Nitric Acid

A powerful corrosive acid composed of nitric oxide and water. In homeopathy, it is prepared by potentising dilute nitric acid. The acid is a colourless, highly oxidising liquid that turns yellow on decomposition.

First proved by Hahnemann and published in Chronic Diseases. Later confirmed by Hering, Allen, and Clarke through clinical observation.

Nitric acid reflects deep erosion—of tissues, relationships, and inner peace. It is suited to patients who have suffered indignity, betrayal, or humiliation and now live with inner bitterness. They are precise, intense, and unyielding—physically and emotionally. Their health fears are not neurotic but often rooted in real suffering. The splinter-like pains symbolise a psyche torn by inner injury and unresolved trauma.

• Mucous membranes – especially mouth, rectum, genitals
• Skin – fissures, ulcers, warts
• Urinary organs – bladder, urethra
• Digestive tract – stomach, anus
• Mind – irritability, unforgiving nature, anxiety about health

The Nitric acid patient is marked by intense irritability, deep-seated anxiety, and a strongly unforgiving disposition. They hold grudges, remember every offence, and can become vengeful. [Kent] describes them as having “anger with fixed ideas and an inability to forgive.” This can evolve into a bitter, distrustful state where the patient isolates emotionally and becomes hypercritical of others.

There is an ever-present anxiety about health, bordering on hypochondriasis. The slightest symptom causes alarm, and the fear of incurable disease is constant. Restlessness and gloom dominate their emotional life. A peculiar combination of suspicion, sadness, and explosive irritability may be seen. They feel forsaken, easily offended, and often despair of recovery. [Clarke] notes that Nitric acid is suited to patients who are “weak in body but strong in resentment.”

Sleep disturbed by pain or anxiety. Wakes unrefreshed. Nightmares of death or disease. Dreams anxious or of falling. Sleep light and restless.

Frightful dreams of blood, wounds, and helplessness. Often dreams of dying, being forsaken, or being injured. Recurring dreams of being stabbed or pierced.

Acidum nitricum is a remedy of sharpness—of pain, personality, and pathology. The keynote “splinter-like pain” appears in nearly every sphere. There is also ulceration, bleeding, foul discharge, and profound fatigue. Suitable for patients who are worn, bitter, anxious about health, and full of unresolved resentment. All discharges are offensive, and the patient often appears older than their years. The combination of emotional intensity and physical decay defines the essence of this remedy.

Chill in evening, heat at night. Sweats offensive and cold. Fever often low-grade but persistent in chronic conditions. Flushes of heat with anxiety and restlessness.

Chill predominates, especially in open air. Heat internally, with cold hands and feet. Sweat offensive, sticky, and stains clothing yellow. Worse from exertion or warmth of bed.

Headaches are violent, tearing, or stabbing, often located in the temples or forehead. Pain may extend to the neck or eyes. Sensation as if the head would burst, especially from suppressed anger. Worse from motion, noise, or exertion. Vertigo on rising, with a tendency to fall backward. Hair may fall out in patches, especially in syphilitic or cachectic individuals. Face pale, with a sickly expression.

Burning, itching, and excessive sensitivity to light. Ulceration of the cornea in debilitated states. Lachrymation acrid and copious. Pustular conjunctivitis, especially in children with poor hygiene. Visual disturbances during headaches. Iritis in syphilitic cases, often with photophobia and tearing.

Cracking and roaring in ears. Stabbing pain as if from a splinter. Ulceration and discharge, often offensive and greenish. Hearing impaired by thickening of the eustachian tube or middle ear. Worse in damp weather or at night.

Nasal ulcers with bloody discharge and scabs. Offensiveness is marked. Coryza excoriating, worse on exposure to cold. Bleeding from nose, especially at night. Nose red and cracked, with fissures at alae. Bones of the nose may be affected in advanced syphilitic cases.

Face pale, yellowish, or sickly with deep lines of suffering. Lips cracked, ulcerated, bleeding easily. Corners of the mouth fissured, painful to open. Acne or pustules in youth with suppressed anger or guilt. Facial neuralgia worse at night.

Mouth full of ulcers, especially on the gums, tongue, and inner cheeks. Bleeding gums, spongy and offensive. Tongue fissured, ulcerated, and coated yellow or brown. Profuse salivation with metallic or bitter taste. Halitosis strong and offensive, even after cleaning. Sensation of a splinter or hair stuck in the throat or mouth—a keynote. [Hering]

Toothache < at night, worse from cold air or cold water. Teeth feel loose, elongated, or sensitive to touch. Caries develop rapidly. Gums recede and bleed easily. Pain sharp, sticking, and often accompanied by ulcers.

Rawness and ulceration. Swallowing painful, especially solid food. Sensation as if splinters are lodged in the throat—a well-known keynote. Tonsils swollen and inflamed, worse on the left. Persistent catarrhal conditions with thick, green discharges.

Stitching, stabbing pains in chest, worse on motion or deep breath. Constriction with sighing respiration. Cough dry and exhausting, worse at night. Haemoptysis in advanced or tubercular cases. Chest feels bruised or ulcerated.

Palpitations with anxiety and gastric symptoms. Pulse irregular or intermittent. Angina-like pain extending to left arm. Chest oppression worse from exertion. Restlessness and fear of heart stopping at night.

Dyspnoea, particularly at night. Hoarseness with raw feeling in larynx. Tightness in throat-chest junction. Dry cough with splinter-like sensation. Asthmatic tendencies after suppressed eruptions or discharges.

Great anxiety about digestion, with sour eructations, nausea, and heartburn. Craving for fat, indigestible food, which worsens the condition. Gnawing or burning pain, worse at night and from milk. Vomiting of sour, bitter, or bloody substances. Gastric ulceration in melancholic patients. Hypochondriasis linked to gastric distress.

Fullness, bloating, and pain after eating. Cutting, colicky pains around the navel. Liver tender and enlarged, with stitching pains. Spleen may also be involved in chronic cases. Hernia with burning pain and sensitivity to touch. Intestinal sluggishness with gas and foul-smelling stools.

One of the most characteristic spheres of action. Constipation with great straining and sharp, knife-like pain. Fissures of the anus, painful and bleeding. Haemorrhoids that bleed easily and are exquisitely painful to touch or sitting. Stool offensive, green, or mucous-coated. Even soft stool passed with pain. Splinter-like sensation in rectum is a grand keynote. [Boericke]

Urine dark, strong-smelling, or bloody. Urging to urinate with burning or cutting pain. Urine smells like horse urine—a confirmatory keynote. Incontinence in the aged or weakened. Cystitis with offensive discharges. Urethral stricture with lancinating pain.

Craves fat, indigestible foods, and salt. Aversion to bread, milk, and sweets. Complaints worsen from butter and milk. Excessive thirst, especially at night. Appetite variable, often lost in advanced illness.

Gonorrhoeal and syphilitic history with lingering discharges or ulcerations. Warts on genitals, often hard and bleeding. Soreness and cracking of the glans. Erections painful or absent. Seminal emissions with great weakness. Itching or smarting of the urethra.

Leucorrhoea offensive, corrosive, and greenish. Menses early, profuse, and prolonged, with soreness and cramping. Ulcers on cervix or vagina, especially in syphilitic patients. Warts on genitals. Burning during intercourse. Pruritus vulvae with splinter-like pains.

Stiffness and pain, especially between shoulders. Small of back feels weak or bruised. Pain in coccyx when sitting. Spine sensitive to pressure in the dorsal region. Worse at night.

Painful corns, bunions, and ulcers on feet. Cracks on fingers and heels. Splinter-like pain in soles and fingertips. Trembling from exhaustion. Cold hands and feet with inward heat. Nails brittle and distorted.

Cracks, fissures, and ulcers with splinter-like pains. Warts that are large, jagged, and bleed easily. Foul-smelling discharges from ulcers. Eruptions that resist healing. Ulcers with indurated base, especially on mucocutaneous junctions. [Clarke]

• Mercurius – Also syphilitic and ulcerative, but Merc. is more moist, changeable, and offensive; Nit-ac. is sharper and more irritable
• Thuja – Warts and sycosis; more suppressed and secretive; Nit-ac. more ulcerative, painful
• Sulphur – Also offensive discharges, but more reactive, robust, and open
• Hepar sulphuris – Sensitive to touch and pain, but more suppurative; Nit-ac. more ulcerative and indurated
• Kali bichromicum – Deep ulceration and stringy discharges, but more thick, ropy; Nit-ac. more painful and splintery

• Complementary: Natrum muriaticum, Arsenicum album
• Antidotes: Camphora, Opium
• Follows well: Mercurius, Arsenicum
• Precedes well: Thuja, Lycopodium, Hepar sulphuris

• First remedy to consider in fissures, ulcers, and painful warts
• Useful in constipation with knife-like rectal pain
• Valuable in post-syphilitic conditions with ulceration and foul discharges
• Think of it in patients with bitterness, hypercriticism, and fear of incurability
• Great in chronic cystitis with cutting pain and offensive urine

Mind

• Anger, lasting
• Anxiety about health
• Unforgiving
• Suspicious, easily offended

Rectum

• Fissures, painful
• Splinter-like pain during stool
• Constipation, with soft stool
• Haemorrhoids, bleeding, painful

Skin

• Cracks, fissures, painful
• Warts, bleeding, hard
• Ulcers, indurated base
• Splinter-like sensation

Mouth

• Ulcers, painful
• Tongue, cracked
• Salivation, offensive

Urinary

• Urine, offensive, horsey odour
• Urethra, burning pain
• Stricture, painful

Generalities

• Worse cold
• Worse night
• Splinter-like pain
• Ulceration, chronic

Samuel Hahnemann – Chronic Diseases: Original proving and chronic indications

C. Hering – Guiding Symptoms: Detailed local symptoms and keynotes (splinter pains, urine odour)

James Kent – Lectures on Homoeopathic Materia Medica: Psychological themes and syphilitic miasm discussion

John Henry Clarke – Dictionary of Practical Materia Medica: Expanded physical symptoms, especially for mouth, skin, and rectum

William Boericke – Materia Medica: Condensed clinical essentials, modality notes, and mind section