Southern Dental Association - Sixteenth Annual Session. [Volume: 26, Issue: 8, August, 1884, pp. 498-507]

SOUTHERN DENTAL ASSOOIATION.

499

points of the incisors are worn away. Undoubtedly calcification
will be completed by that time. Ordinarily he thought it would
not be safe to interfere in the way of changing the position of the
teeth until the fourteenth or fifteenth year; but on the other hand,
regulation may be hopefully undertaken in favorable cases up to
fifty years of age. All who have attempted regulation know that
in many cases the teeth are moved easily without marked irrita.
tion; and that in other cases marked irritation is easily set up, suggesting that caution is at all times necessary. As the result of the
shifting of the teeth the process is absorbed before and a new formation is set up behind the tooth which is moved to hold it in place.
It is a question whether this new formation is more or less susceptible to disease than the original process; the speaker has sometimes
thought it was more susceptible, but the question still remains undecided. The Coffin method of regulating should be more generally known and practiced. The speaker thought it the best that
had been brought to his notice, especially where the arch is to be
enlarged. The plate is so constructed that the pressure comes
against all parts of the arch, and the teeth retain more nearly their
original position and are less subject to changes. Dr. Patrick's appliance is very efficient and in many cases is as good or better than
any other, but the Coffin plate seems to have a wider range of applicability. These two seem to embrace about all that is required in
any conceivable case of regulating, and if they were thoroughly understood it seemed to him there would be very little occasion for
any of the intricate appliances sometimes used. If the teeth are
let alone they will in many cases come into their places without
aid. In many other cases, intelligent patients, or their mothers,
may accomplish much by persistent manipulation. Boys and girls
will often take an interest in the regulation of their teeth, and the
dentist would do well to direct them, if they are intelligent, and
will give the time and attention necessary, how to proceed. The
results reached by this course are much better in many cases than
any quick work would be. An unsatisfactory feature of regulating
cases is that not one case in a dozen is properly remunerated. The
time devoted by the dentist to the regulation of a set of teeth would
yield a much larger income if employed in almost any other direction. The money to be received should not of course be the sole object, but it should be. taken into consideration.
President McKellops. Dr. Patrick has a letter from a prominent
officer of the Ordnance Department at Washington in relation to the
swelling of amalgams in fillings, which would be of interest to us.
Dr. Patrick spoke of his paper on "Oral Electricity and the New
Departure," read before the American Dental Association at Boston,