Pinworms, also known as threadworms, are a common type of worm around the world. They usually aren’t longer than 1/2 an inch. You get them when you swallow their eggs. The eggs hatch in your intestines. At night, female pinworms exit your body and lay thousands of tiny eggs around your anus. If those eggs are passed to other people, the worms spread. Pinworm infections happen most often when kids pass them to other kids. Often there are no symptoms, but they may cause:

• Itching
• Pain
• Nausea

Roundworms are common in warm places where there’s poor sanitation. When a person swallows roundworm eggs, the worms hatch in the intestines. The young worms then go to the lungs. After a week or two, the worms go to the throat and often get swallowed again. Roundworms spread through soil mixed with infected poop or by eating raw infected meat. Symptoms include:

• Coughing
• Wheezing
• Belly pain
• Vomiting
• Diarrhea
• Fatigue
• Weight loss

Hookworms also are common in the tropics. When the poop of an infected person is mixed into the soil, the eggs will hatch. At a certain stage, young hookworms can go through a person’s skin. This can happen if people go barefoot in places where the soil is contaminated. An itchy rash is usually the first sign of hookworms. Other symptoms include:

• Belly pain
• Diarrhea
• Weight loss
• Loss of appetite
• Fatigue
• Anemia

Another type of tiny roundworm (Strongyloidiasis stercoralis) causes this disease. People mainly get them when young worms in soil go through their skin. Once in the body, the worms find their way to the small intestine and lay eggs. Those eggs hatch before they are pooped out and the worms may infect someone else. Often there aren’t any symptoms, but the worms can cause:

• Belly pain
• Bloating
• Heartburn
• Diarrhea
• Constipation
• Dry cough
• Skin rashes

Trichinella roundworms cause trichinosis. You get it by eating infected meat, especially pork, that’s raw or undercooked. When a person eats infected meat, stomach acid dissolves cysts in the meat to release worm larvae. The worms go to the intestine, grow up, mate, and lay eggs. After hatching, young worms go through the blood to the muscles. Symptoms include:

• Nausea and vomiting
• Diarrhea
• Fatigue
• Fever
• Headaches
• Swelling
• Muscle and joint pain

Whipworm (Trichuris trichiura) larvae and adults can live in your intestine. Whipworms get their name because of their shape. Like many other parasitic worms, they spread through contaminated soil in warm places. Often there aren’t symptoms unless the infection is heavy. Symptoms include:

• Diarrhea mixed with mucus, water, or blood
• Stunted growth
• Rectal prolapse, when part of the large intestine detaches and slides out of the anus

You can get tapeworms from food or water that’s contaminated with worms or eggs. If you swallow tapeworms, they’ll grow up in your intestines. They can live in a person for 30 years. If you swallow the eggs, they can go through your intestines into other parts of the body to form cysts. Symptoms depend on where they are and include:

• Nausea
• Weakness
• Loss of appetite
• Belly pain
• Diarrhea
• Feeling dizzy
• Craving salt
• Weight loss
• Headaches
• Seizures

Blood flukes are flatworms that cause a condition called schistosomiasis (aka bilharzia or snail fever). People get them if they spend time in fresh water where infected snails live. The fork-shaped worms emerge from snails and can then go through a person’s skin and into the blood where they become adults. When females release eggs, it may cause:

• Belly pain
• Diarrhea
• Blood in urine

Chronic infection can cause:

• Anemia
• Stunted growth
• Organ damage

Three types of tiny, thread-like worms cause this disease. It’s common in the tropics and subtropics. Adult worms can live up to 7 years in a person’s lymph system. The disease only spreads from person to person through mosquitoes. When a mosquito bites an infected person, they can spread the tiny worms to other people they bite. It often doesn’t have symptoms, but can cause:

• Damage to the lymph system
• Swelling
• Trouble fighting infections

If a doctor suspects you have worms, they will run tests to see if you do and find out what kind they are. Those tests might include:

• Looking for signs of worms or eggs in your poop
• Inserting a tube in your mouth or rectum to look at your intestine (endoscopy or colonoscopy)
• Blood tests
• X-ray or other imaging tests
• Looking at a sample of your muscle

If you have worms, medicines can kill them. Sometimes you might need other treatments for symptoms related to the infection, including:

• Anti-inflammatory drugs (steroids)
• Pain relievers
• Anti-seizure medicine
• If you have cysts in your muscles, you might need surgery.

Homeopathic Treatment Parasitic Infection or Worms

Cuprum Oxydatum Nigrum

Cuprum Oxydatum Nigrum Trituration provides relief in the case of worms, Hookworm, tapeworm, trichinosis, roundworm, and cramps in the stomach with vomiting.

Abrotanum

Slimy mouth taste. Appetite good, but emaciation progresses. Destroys worms especially Ascarides (roundworms). Pain in stomach; worse at night; cutting, gnawing pain. Stomach feels as if swimming in water; feels cold. Gnawing hunger and whining. Bloody stools; worse as rheumatic pains abate. Ascarides; oozing from umbilicus.

Anantherum Muricatum

Tapeworms with morbid hunger. Wakes at night. Painful swelling of various parts, going on to suppuration. Glandular inflammation. Elephantiasis.

Cina

This is a children’s remedy, big, fat, rosy, scrofulous, corresponding to many conditions that may be referred to intestinal irritation, such as worms and accompanying complaints. An irritability of temper, variable appetite, grinding of teeth worms, it is the head remedy for round and tapeworms with the grinding of teeth. Twisting pain about navel. Bloated and hard abdomen. Itching of anus.

Twitching and jerking distortion of limbs, trembling. Paralyzed shocks; patient will jump suddenly, as though in pain. Stretches out feet spasmodically. Child gets on hands and knees in sleep; on abdomen. Night terrors of children; cries out, screams, wakes frightened. Troubles while yawning. Screams and talks in sleep. Grits teeth.

Sanguineria Canadensis

Craving for piquant things. Unquenchable thirst. Burning, vomiting. Nausea, with salivation. Sinking, faint all-gone feeling. Spitting up of bile; gastro-duodenal catarrh. Diarrhoea as coryza improves. Pain over region of liver. Diarrhoea; bilious, liquid, gushing stool. Cancer of rectum.

Face flushed. Neuralgia; pain extends in all directions from upper jaw. Redness and burning of cheeks. Hectic flush. Fullness and tenderness behind angle of jaws. Hay-fever. Ozaena, with profuse, offensive yellowish discharges. Nasal polypi. Coryza, followed by diarrhoea. Chronic rhinitis; membrane dry and congested.

Burning in ears. Earache with headache. Humming and roaring. Aural polyps. Throat swollen dry and constricted. Ulceration of mouth and fauces, with dry, burning sensation Tongue white; feels scalded. Tonsillitis. Sun headache. Periodical sick headache; pain begins in occiput, spreads upwards, and settles over eyes. Veins and temples are distended. Burning in eyes. Pain in the back of head.

Edema of larynx. Trachea sore. Heat and tension behind the sternum. Aphonia. Cough of gastric origin. Cough, with burning pain in chest. Sputum tough, rust-colored, offensive, almost impossible to raise. Spasmodic cough after influenza and after whooping-cough. Tickling behind sternum, causes a constant hacking cough; worse at night on lying down.

Severe dyspnoea. Offensive breath and purulent expectoration. Fibroid phthisis. Pneumonia. Asthma with stomach disorders. Valvular disease with lung development, phosphates in urine and loss of flesh.

Extremities: Rheumatism. Rheumatic pains in places least covered by flesh. Right-side neuritis; better touching the part.

Skin: Antidotes to poisoning. Red, blotchy eruptions; worse in spring. Burning and itching; worse by heat. Acne, with scanty menses. Circumscribed red spots over malar bones.

Filix Mas

A remedy for worm symptoms, especially with constipation. Tapeworm. Soporific conditions. Torpid inflammations of lymphatic glands; and efficient remedy for expulsion of tapeworm especially with constipation. Bloated: Gnawing-pain; worse eating sweets. Diarrhea and vomiting. Worm colic, with itching of nose, pale face, blue rings around eyes. Painless hiccough.

Natrum Phosphoricum

Natrum phosphoricum is the remedy for conditions arising from excess of lactic acid, often resulting from too much sugar. Ailments, with excess of acidity. Sour eructation and taste. Sour vomiting. Yellow, creamy coating at the back of the roof of mouth and tongue, intestinal, long, round or threadworms with picking at nose n tendency. Flatulence, with sour risings. Colic, with symptoms of worms. Itching in various parts, especially of ankles. Hives. Smooth, red, shining. Erysipelas. Feet icy cold in daytime, burn at night. Swelling of lymphatic glands.

Abrotanum

Slimy taste. Appetite good, but emaciation progresses. Food passes undigested. Pain in stomach; worse at night; cutting, gnawing pain. Stomach feels as if swimming in water; feels cold. Gnawing hunger and whining. Indigestion, with vomiting of large quantities of offensive fluid. Hard lumps in abdomen. Distended. Alternate diarrhea and constipation. Hemorrhoid; frequent urging; bloody stools; worse as rheumatic pains abate. Ascarides. Oozing from umbilicus. Sensation as if bowels were sinking down.

Eruptions come out on face; are suppressed, and the skin becomes purplish. Skin flabby and loose. Elephantiasis. Furuncles. Falling out of hair. Itching chilblains.

Spigelia

Itching and crawling in rectum. Frequent ineffectual urging to stool. Ascarides. Strabismus, jerking with paleness of the face, blue rings around the eyes, faint nauseated feeling with colic about the navel caused by worms.

Ignatia Amara

Rumbling in bowels. Weak feeling in upper abdomen. Throbbing in abdomen. Colicky, griping pains in one or both sides of abdomen. Itching and stitching up the rectum. Prolapse. Rectal muscles weakness (Stools pass with difficulty); painful constriction of anus after stool. Stitches in haemorrhoids during cough. Diarrhoea from fright. Stitches from anus deep into rectum. Haemorrhage and pain; worse when stool is loose. Pressure as of a sharp instrument from within outward. Sour eructation. All-gone feeling in stomach; much flatulence; hiccough. Cramps in stomach. Averse to ordinary diet; longs for great variety of indigestible articles. Craving for acidic things. Sinking in stomach.

Asthenopia, with spasms of lids, Neuralgic pain about eyes. Flickering zig zags. Twitching of muscles of face and lips. Changes color when at rest. Sour mouth taste. Easily bites inside of cheeks. Constantly full of saliva. Feeling of a lump in throat. Tendency to choke, globus hystericus. Sore throat; stitches when not swallowing. Stitches between acts of swallowing, extend to ear. Tonsils inflamed, swollen, with small ulcers. Follicular tonsillitis. Dry spasmodic cough in quick successive shocks. Spasm of glottis. Reflex coughs. Coughing increases the desire to cough. Much sighing. Hollow spasmodic cough, worse in the evening, little expectoration, leaving pain in trachea.

Pain in tendo-Achilles and calf. Ulcerative pain in soles. Sleep very light. Jerking of limbs on going to sleep. Insomnia from grief, cares, with itching of arms and violent yawning.

Fever, chill with thirst; not relieved by external heat. During fever, itching; nettle-rash all over body. Itching. Very sensitive to draught of air. Excoriation, especially around vagina and mouth.

Teucrium Marum Verum

Vomiting of large quantities of dark-green masses. Constant hiccough, attended with pain in back. Unnatural appetite. Hiccough on eating, after nursing. Itching of anus, and constant irritation in the evening in bed. Ascarides, with nightly restlessness. Crawling in rectum after stool.

Sabadilla

Ascarides, with reflex symptoms (nymphomania; convulsive symptoms). Children’s diarrhea with constant cutting pains. Spasmodic pain in stomach with dry cough and difficult breathing. No thirst. Loathing for strong food. Canine appetite for sweets and farinaceous food. Pyrosis; copious salivation. Cold, empty feeling in stomach. Desire for hot things. Sweetish taste.

Scirrhinum

Homeopathy medicine for Breast, cancer of. Cancer. Cancerous diathesis. Glands, enlarged. Hemorrhages. Varicose. Threadworms, any type of worms, it helps in the passage of worms when Cina and Teucrium fail.

Merc solubilis

Putrid eructations. Intense thirst for cold drinks. Weak digestion, with continuous hunger. Stomach sensitive to touch. Hiccough and regurgitation. Cough, with yellow mucopurulent expectoration. Whooping-cough with nosebleed. Throat – Bluish-red swelling. Constant desire to swallow. Putrid sore throat. Stitches into ear on swallowing; fluids return through nose. Quinsy, with difficulty swallowing.

Slow in answering questions. Memory weakened, and loss of will-power. Weary of life. Mistrustful. Vertigo. Stinging, burning, fetid eruptions on scalp. Loss of hair. Exostosis. Oily sweat on head.

Eyelids red, thick, swollen. Profuse, burning, acrid discharge. Floating black spots. Parenchymatous keratitis of syphilitic origin with burning pain. Iritis, with hypopyon.

Otalgia. Boils in external canal. Sneezing. Sneezing in sunshine. Nostrils raw, ulcerated; nasal bones swollen. Coryza; acrid discharge. Pain and swelling of nasal bones, and caries, with greenish fetid ulceration.

Face pale, earthy, dirty-looking, puffy. Aching in facial bones, Syphilitic pustules on face. Sweetish metallic taste in mouth. Salivary secretions greatly increased; bloody, viscid, fetid and coppery. Trembling tongue. Gums spongy, bleed easily. Teeth decay. Teeth loose, feel tender and elongated. Tongue heavy, thick; moist coating; yellow, flabby, teeth-intended, feels as if burnt, with ulcers, Fetid odor from mouth, can smell it all over room. Alveolar abscess. Great thirst, with moist mouth.

Flatulent distention, with pain. Liver enlarged; sore to touch, indurated. Jaundice. Bile secreted deficiently. Stool greenish, bloody and slimy, worse at night, with pain and tenesmus. Never-get-done feeling. Discharge accompanied by chilliness, sick stomach, cutting colic, and tenesmus. Whitish-gray stools.

Male -Vesicles and ulcers; soft chancre. Cold genitals. Prepuce irritated; itches. Nocturnal emissions, stained with blood.

Female -Sensation of rawness in parts. Stinging pain in ovaries. Itching and burning; worse, after urinating; better, washing with cold water. Morning sickness, with profuse salivation. Mammae painful and full of milk at menses.

Skin almost constantly moist. Persistent dryness of the skin contra indicates mercurius. Excessive odorous viscid perspiration. Vesicular and pustular eruptions. Ulcers, irregular in shape, edges undefined. Pimples around the main eruption. Itching, worse from warmth of bed. Crusta lactea; yellowish-brown crusts, considerable suppuration. Buboes. Orchitis.

Fever -Generally gastric or bilious, with profuse nightly perspiration; debility, slow and lingering. Heat and shuddering alternately. Yellow perspiration. Profuse perspiration without relief. Creeping chilliness, worse in the evening and into night. Alternate flashes of heat in single parts.

Tellurium for Parasitic Infection or Worms

It expels almost all types of worms especially threadworms. Itching of hands and feet. Herpetic spots; ringworm. Ring-shape lesions, offensive odors from affected parts. Barber’s itch. Stinging in skin. Fetid exhalations. Offensive foot-sweat. Eczema, back of ears and occiput. Circular patches of eczema.

Naphthalinum

Saliva flows from the mouth. Loss of appetite. Ataxia. Paralysis of lower limbs. Elephantiasis. Eczema. Flatulence. Gleet. Whooping-cough. Worms. Lips and face cyanotic. Face pale yellow. Twitching of facial muscles.

Santoninum

It is of unquestioned value in the treatment of worm diseases, as gastro-intestinal irritation, itching of nose, restless sleep, twitching of muscles. Ascaris lumbricoides, and thread worms, but not tapeworms. Night cough of children. Fetid breath, depraved appetite; thirsty. Tongue deep-red. Grinding of teeth. Nausea; better after eating. Choking feeling.

Terebinthinae Oleum

Enormous distention. Diarrhea; stools watery, greenish, fetid, bloody. Pain before flatus with and relief after stool. Hemorrhage from bowels. Worms; lumbrici. Abdominal dropsy; pelvic peritonitis. Fainting after every stool Enterocolitis, with hemorrhage and ulceration of bowels.

Acne. Erythema; itching pustular, vesicular eruption; urticaria. Purpura, ecchymosis, dropsies. Scarlatina. Chilblains; with excessive itching and pulsing pains. Aching soreness of the muscles.

Thymol

It is indicated in pathological emissions, priapism and prostatorrhoea. The proving show an action limited to the sexual organs, producing a typical sexual neurasthenia. Specific for hookworm disease. Irritable, arbitrary, must have his own way. Craves company.

Silphium Laciniatum

Silphium Laciniatum has good results in various forms of asthma and chronic bronchitis. Catarrhal influenza. Dysentery; attack preceded by constipated stools covered with white mucus. Cough with expectoration, stringy, frothy, light-colored. Excited by sense of mucus rattling in chest and worse by drafts of air. Constriction of lungs. Catarrh, with copious, stringy, mucous discharges. Desire to hawk and scrape throat. Irritation of posterior nares, involving mucous membranes of nasal passages with constriction of supraorbital region.

Silica Tera

Disgust for meat and warm food. On swallowing food, it easily gets into posterior nares. Want of appetite; thirst excessive. Pit of stomach painful to pressure. Vomiting after drinking. Pain or painful cold feeling in abdomen, with constipation; yellow hands and blue nails. Much rumbling in bowels. Inguinal glands swollen and painful. Hepatic abscess. Rectum feels paralyzed. Fistula in ano. Fissures and haemorrhoids, painful, with spasm of sphincter. Stool comes down with difficulty; when partly expelled, recedes again. Great straining; rectum stings; closes upon stool. Diarrhoea of cadaverous odor.

Urinary bloody, involuntary, with red or yellow sediment. Prostatic fluid discharges when straining at stool. Nocturnal enuresis in patients with worms.

Sensation of a hair on tongue. Boils on gums. Abscess at root of teeth. Pyorrhea. Periodical quinsy. Parotid glands swollen. Stinging pain on swallowing. Hard, cold swelling of cervical glands.

Headaches from fasting. Vertigo from looking up. Profuse sweat of head, offensive, and extends to neck. Pain begins at occiput, and spreads over head and settles over eyes. Swelling in the glabella. Swelling of lacrimal duct. Aversion to light, especially daylight; it produces dazzling, sharp pain through eyes; eyes tender to touch; worse when closed. Vision confused; letters run together on reading. Styes. Iritis and irido-choroiditis, with pus in anterior chamber. Perforating or sloughing ulcer of cornea. Abscess in cornea after traumatic injury. Cataract. After-effects of keratitis and ulcus cornea.

Ears: Fetid discharge. Caries of mastoid. Loud pistol-like report. Sensitive to noise. Tinnitus/Roaring in ears. Nasal itching. Dry, hard crusts form, bleeding when loosened. Nasal bones sensitive. Sneezing in morning. Obstructed and loss of smell. Perforation of septum. Skin cracked on margin of lips. Eruption on chin. Facial neuralgia, throbbing, tearing, face red; worse, cold damp.

Respiratory: Colds fail to yield; sputum persistently muco-purulent and profuse. Slow recovery after pneumonia. Cough and sore throat, with expectoration of little granules like shot, which, when broken, smell very offensive. Cough with expectoration, bloody or purulent. Violent cough when lying down, with thick, yellow lumpy expectoration; suppurative stage of expectoration.

Burning and soreness of genitals, with eruption on inner surface of thighs. Chronic gonorrhoea – thick, fetid discharge. Elephantiasis of scrotum. Sexual erethism; nocturnal emissions. Hydrocele.

Female: A milky, acrid leucorrhoea, during urination. Itching of vulva and vagina; very sensitive. Discharge of blood between menstrual periods. Increased menses, with paroxysms of icy coldness over whole body. Nipples very sore; ulcerated easily; drawn in. Fistulous ulcers of breast. Abscess of labia. Discharge of blood from vagina every time child is nursed. Vaginal cysts hard lumps in breast.

Night-walking. Sleeplessness, with great orgasm of blood and heat in head. Frequent starts in sleep. Anxious dreams. Excessive gaping.

Skin: Felons, abscesses, boils, old fistulous ulcers. Delicate, pale, waxy. Cracks at end of fingers. Painless swelling of glands. Rose-colored blotches. Scars suddenly become painful. Pus offensive. Promotes expulsion of foreign bodies from tissues. Every little injury suppurates. Long lasting suppuration and fistulous tracts. Dry fingertips. Eruptions itch only in daytime and evening. Crippled nails. Indurated tumors. Abscesses of joints. After impure vaccination. Bursa. Lepra, nodes, and coppery spots. Keloid growths.

Fever: Chilliness; very sensitive to cold air. Creeping, shivering. Cold extremities, even in a warm. Sweat at night; worse towards morning. Suffering parts feel cold.

Veratrum Album

A perfect picture of collapse, with extreme coldness, blueness, and weakness, is offered by this medicine. Post-operative shock/Surgical shock. with cold sweat on forehead, pale face, rapid, feeble pulse. Cold perspiration on the forehead, with nearly all complaints. Vomiting, purging, and cramps in extremities.  Excessive dryness of all mucous surfaces. “Coprophagia” violent mania alternates with silence and refusal to talk. Melancholy, with stupor and mania. Sits in a stupid manner; notices nothing; Sullen indifference. Frenzy of excitement; shrieks, curses. Puerperal mania. Aimless wandering from home. Delusions of impending misfortunes. Mania, with desire to cut and tear things. Attacks of pain, with delirium driving to madness. Cursing, howling all night.

Sensation of a lump of ice on vertex. Headache, with nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea, pale face. Neck too weak to hold head up. Eyes surrounded by dark rings. Staring; turned upwards, without luster. Lachrymation with redness. Lids dry heavy. Features sunken. Icy coldness of tip of nose and face. Nose grows more pointed. Tearing in cheeks, temples, and eyes. Face very pale, blue, collapsed, cold. Tongue pale, cold; cool sensation, as from peppermint. Dry in center not relieved by water. Salty saliva.

Voracious appetite. Thirst for cold water, but is vomited as soon as swallowed. Averse to warm food. Hiccough. Copious vomiting and nausea; aggravated by drinking and least motion. Craves fruit, juicy and cold things, ice, salt. Anguish in pit of stomach. Great weakness after vomiting. Sinking and empty feeling in abdomen. Cold feeling in stomach and abdomen. Pain in abdomen preceding stool. Cramps, knotting abdomen and legs. Sensation as if hernia would protrude. Abdomen sensitive to pressure, swollen with terrible colic.

Constipation. Stools large, with much straining until exhausted, with cold sweat. Diarrhoea, very painful, watery, copious, and forcibly evacuated, followed by great prostration. Evacuations of cholera morbus and true cholera when vomiting accompanies the purging.

Hoarse, weak voice. Rattling in chest. Much mucus in bronchial tubes, that cannot be coughed up. Coarse rales. Chronic bronchitis in the aged. Loud barking, stomach cough, followed by eructation of gas; worse, warm room. Hollow cough, tickling low down, with blue face. Cough comes on from drinking, especially cold water; urine escapes when coughing. Cough on entering warm room from cold air. Palpitation with anxiety and rapid audible respiration. Pulse irregular, feeble. Tobacco – heart (from chewing or snuffing). Intermittent action of heart with hepatic obstruction.

Menses too early; profuse and exhausting. Faints from least exertion. Sexual mania precedes menses.

Soreness and tenderness of joints. Sciatica; pains like electric flashes. Cramps in calves. Neuralgia in brachial plexus; arms feel swollen, cold, paralytic. Skin blue, cold, clammy, inelastic. Cold sweat. Wrinkling of skin of hands and feet.

Chenopodium

Specific for hookworm and roundworm.

Caladium

Dropsical swellings. Gleet. Impotence. Irritation. Nymphomania. Pruritus vagina. Spermatorrhoea. Typhoid. Typhus. Worms. Caladium is useful when worms travel over the perineum and get into the vagina in little girls with tendency to excite masturbation. Spasmodic cutting pain in stomach and abdomen. Abdomen swollen and tender to touch. After stool thin red blood passes. Discharge of mucus from the rectum after stool. Stitches in rectum after stool. Soft, pasty, clay-colored stools, passed with difficulty. Stool containing hard lumps. Very scanty, pasty stool. Urging to stool on rising in the morning.

Treatment for worms doesn’t keep you from getting them again. To avoid getting worms, try these tips:

• Wash often.
• Avoid soil contaminated with poop from people or animals.
• Don’t eat raw or undercooked meat.
• Treat any pets that have worms.