Pennsylvania Association of Dental Surgeons. [Volume: 2, Issue: 3, October, 1860, pp. 150-168]

162

THE DENTAL COSMOS.

In illustration of the effects of this remedy upon the teeth, he
exhibited three teeth which had been exposed to the action of the officinal
preparation for twenty-four hours; on examination, the enamel of the
teeth was found considerably softened.
Reference was then made to the indiscriminate manner in which the
different mercurial preparations had been employed in former times, and
the unfortunate sequences which followed their use, viz.: the loosening
and falling out of teeth, accompanied, in many instances, by the extensive
exfoliations of bone. Fortunately, such results are but rarely presented
in our day. For instance, those horrible deformities of the face accompanying the syphilitic disease so common in other days, are rarely presented in ours; and this is no doubt due to the fact that mercury is not
employed to the same extent or in the careless manner which formerly
characterized its use. As had been truly said, "mercury is a two-edged
sword, capable of doing a great deal of good or a great deal of harm according as it is properly or improperly employed."
Dr. Fitch thought the importance of this subject had not been fully
appreciated by the dental practitioner. Medicinal agents must act upon
the teeth, if at all, either constitutionally or chemically; and in our investigations we must necessarily trespass upon the hitherto acknowledged
domain of the medical practitioner.
That important influences are exerted upon the teeth by the constant
changes superinduced in the organism by the administration of different
medicinal agents, cannot be a question of doubt; and although the teeth,
of all the human organs, are the lowest in the scale of vitality, we must
yet recognize the two forces of organic life, viz., vital and chemical, as
presiding over them. If this be a true position, it follows naturally that
these forces, in their harmonious or disturbed action, must be ever active
as in other organs, yet in a degree corresponding to the grade of their
vitality, to preserve the integrity of organic power in repelling and resisting
disease, or to render their structure an easy prey to constitutional,
chemical, or mechanical influences.
The two last-named conditions may be overcome to a certain extent by
local treatment, but the former will require a restoration to harmony
of the organic forces which control and direct nutrition, disintegration,
etc., influences which properly constitute the tissue a living structure.
To restore this harmony of the chemico-vital force, viewed either in a
general or specific sense, requires general or constitutional treatment;
but that there is great danger of producing this functional disturbance by
an exhibition of medicinal agents, whenever given, either in doses too
large or too long continued, is a position which cannot be successfully
controverted.
If this may occur, and it no doubt often does, why should not the
dentist, in diagnosing and treating diseases of the teeth, not only extend