The Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology, and Remedial Treatment of the Fifth Pair of Nerves. [Volume: 2, Issue: 2, September, 1860, pp. 77-88]

THE DENTAL COSMOS.

sympathetic nervous system, and which brings them in close relation with
the other organs concerned in nutrition, the varied influences they possess
become an additional and more extended field of observation. It must be
evident, therefore, to every medical and dental practitioner, that a correct
knowledge of the anatomy and physiology of the fifth pair of nerves, and
of the intimate relations existing between them and the nervous system
generally, is indispensable to a proper appreciation of the pathological
conditions to which these nerves are liable, and the sympathetic derangements frequently developed in other portions of the economy, induced
primarily by dental irritation.
It may be truly said, that the first step toward the cure of disease, is to
discover what the disease is, and where it is situated. The search, however, to determine what organ or function is deranged, must be most vague
and indefinite without a knowledge of the structure, offices, and relations
which the various parts bear to each other and the organism generally.
The practice of medicine, surgery, and dentistry afford numerous examples illustrating the position, that a sound and rational practice in either
department must be based upon a correct knowledge of anatomy and
physiology. To no portion of the human economy, however, does this
remark apply with more force than to the fifth pair of nerves; for, prier
to the valuable discoveries of Sir Charles Bell and other investigators,
with regard to the functions of the cranial nerves and the general doctrines of nervous action, it was supposed that the seat of that painful
affection, tic douloureux, was in the facial nerve or porta dura of the
seventh pair. Carefully conducted experiments, however, have clearly
demonstrated, not only that the
facial nerve is, to a very great degree, devoid of sensibility, and,
therefore, cannot be the seat of a
painful affection, but that, emerging
firom the stylo-mastoid foramen, and
then passing through the parotid
gland, to be eventually distributed
to the superficial muscles of the
face, in the form of a plexus, named
pes anserinus, it is purely a motor
nerve, upon the integrity of which
the expression of the countenance
and the varied play of the features
depend. Before this was ascertained, section of the nerve at the
FACIAL NrEav. —From DALTON. stylo-mastoid foramen was frequently performed for the relief of
patients suffering under tic douloureux, but with no other result than