Gum and Alveolar Diseases. [Volume: 21, Issue: 4, April, 1879, pp. 192-201]

192

THE DENTAL COSMOS.

teen hundred years, or to within one hundred and fifty years of our
own time; in fact, in essential particulars, it differs not from that of
to-day.
Celsus concludes his first preface with the following sensible remarks, a credit both to his head and his heart: "To return to the
point, my opinion is that medicine ought to be rational, but to draw
its methods from evident causes, those that are obscure being removed
-not from the artist, but from the art. Then again, to dissect living
bodies is both cruel and superfluous, but to dissect the dead is necessary for learners, since they ought to know the order and position
of the parts, which a cadaver will better show than a living and
wounded man. But of other things, which are only to be discovered
in living bodies, practice itself will demonstrate these in the treatment
and care of the wounded; a little more slowly, perhaps, but with more
compassion. Having delivered my views on these points, I shall lay
down the proper rules to govern people in health, then proceed to
those which are related to diseases and their cure."
(To be continued.)
GUM AND ALVEOLAR DISEASES.
BY C. G. DAVIS) D.D.S:, NEW BEDFORD, MASS.
AT the Massachusetts Dental Society, held in Boston on the 12th of
December last, I read a hastily prepared paper upon "Riggs's disease," and being requested to publish it, I offer the following to the
DENTAL COSMOS as embodying the ideas therein.
There are three forms in which gum lesions, such as I confine this
paper to, present themselves. The first is a simple recession of the
gums, exposing more or less of the necks of the teeth, without any
other sign of disease than loss of substance. We see this shortening
of the gum in persons who are very particular in the use of the brush;
the mouth is especially well kept; the teeth have a polished enamel;
are usually not largely decayed, prominently set in the arch, and the
gums are pink in hue and of firm consistence. The gums have
simply withdrawn from the natural point of attachment,-the terminal thin edge of the enamel,-retired gracefully and calmly, without excitement or "flurry," taking with them the delicate alveolar
borders; and leaving exposed the polished cemental covering of the
neck of the tooth.
What is the cause of this condition? Chiefly feeble vascular action.
It arises in the mouths of persons who have indigestion, and whose
circulation is less active in the surface vessels or capillaries of the skin.
The gums themselves are of a pale pink, and do not bleed more than