Petroleum in Homeopathy: Complete Materia Medica Guide, Keynotes & Uses

• Common Name: Crude Rock Oil
• Source: Distilled crude oil
• Family: Hydrocarbon compound
• Preparation: Trituration of the crude oil

Sphere of Action

Acts on the skin, mucous membranes, and gastrointestinal tract. Especially effective in chronic skin conditions, eczema, cracks, and gastric disturbances. It also deeply affects the nervous system and vertigo symptoms.

Constitutional Indications

• Thin, dry, chilly individuals
• Subjects with dirty, rough, cracked skin
• Worse in winter or cold weather
• Complaints worsened by motion, traveling, and during pregnancy

Mind

• Irritability, low spirits
• Easily angered, sensitive to noise and confusion
• Mental dullness; forgetful
• Sad, depressed, especially with chronic skin or gastric troubles

Head

• Vertigo — especially on rising, when riding in a car or ship (motion sickness)
• Headache with nausea and sensation of emptiness in stomach
• Scalp itchy, dry, or covered with scabs

Skin

• Cracks, fissures, especially on hands, fingertips, nipples, ears, and between fingers
• Eczema that oozes, thickens, and cracks
• Dry, hard, rough, dirty-looking skin
• Chilblains (frostbite-like eruptions) that itch and burn
• Skin eruptions worsen in cold weather, especially winter

Face

• Cracked lips and corners of the mouth
• Eczema or eruptions around the ears and face
• Dryness of lips and nose

Stomach & Abdomen

• Nausea, especially in the morning and when traveling
• Sea-sickness, motion sickness, even from reading in motion
• Empty, gone feeling in stomach, not relieved by eating
• Aversion to fatty foods, nausea from the smell of food

Rectum

• Constipation with hard, dry stool, causing fissures
• Painful cracks in anus
• Stools difficult to pass, followed by bleeding

Urinary

• Scanty, dark urine with strong odor
• Urine may cause burning in urethra
• Sensation as if some urine remains after urination

Female

• Cracked nipples with burning pain
• Leucorrhoea thick, yellow, burning
• Itching vulva during pregnancy

Extremities

• Cracked hands and feet, especially in winter
• Nails deformed, thick, brittle
• Painful cracks on fingertips
• Itching, burning of palms and soles
• Chilblains with blisters and itching

Modalities

Worse From	Better From
Cold weather, winter	Warmth, rest
Motion, traveling, riding in a car	Lying down
Pregnancy	Warm wraps, hot drinks

Miasmatic Influence

• Psoric and sycotic

Keynotes

• Winter eczema with deep cracks and bleeding
• Nausea and vertigo from riding or motion
• Fissured skin in cold weather, especially hands, feet, nipples
• Skin looks dirty, rough, and hard

Relationship

Complementary Remedies	Compare With	Antidotes
Graphites, Nitric acid	Bryonia, Sepia, Sulphur, Tabacum	Nux vomica, Cocculus

Potency & Dosage

• Best in low to medium potencies (3x to 30C)
• Chronic cases may respond well to higher potencies under guidance
• External application not recommended

One-Line Summary

"Petroleum is suited for chronic skin affections with cracks and for nausea and vertigo from motion."