Treatise on the natural history and diseases of the human teeth : explaining their structure, use, formation, growth, and diseases, in two parts / by John Hunter ; with notes by Thomas Bell.

  • John Hunter
Date:
1839
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Treatise on the natural history and diseases of the human teeth : explaining their structure, use, formation, growth, and diseases, in two parts / by John Hunter ; with notes by Thomas Bell. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    These circumstances, with regard to the shedding of the teeth, contradict the notion of the second set being made broader and thicker by the resistance they meet with in pushing out the first. For were we, on a partial view of the subject, to admit the sup- position, the bicuspides would effectually overturn our hypothesis, because here the second set are much smaller than the first, and vet the resistance would be greater to them than to the incisores. From the manner in which the teeth are shed, it is evident that drawing a temporary tooth for the easier protrusion of the one underneath, will be of no great service; for in general it falls out before the other can touch it. But it is often of much more service to pull out the neighbouring or adjacent temporary tooth, for we must be convinced by what has been advanced with regard to the changes in size, that excepting the whole were to be shed at the same time, or the order of shedding, viz. from before backwards, were to be inverted, that the second set of incisores and cuspidati must be pinced in room till the grinders are also shed, and there- fore we find it often of use to draw a temporary tooth that is placed further back; and it would, perhaps, be right upon the whole, always to draw at least the first grinder, and perhaps, some time after, the second grinder also.* Of the Cavity filling up as the Teeth wear down. A tooth very often wears down so low that its cavity would be exposed if no other alteration were produced in it. To prevent this, Nature has taken care that the bottom part of the cavity should be filled up by new matter in proportion as the surface of the teeth is worn down. This new matter may be easily known from the old, for when a tooth has been worn down almost to the neck, a spot may always be seen in the middle, which is more transparent, and at the same time of a darker colour (occasioned in some measure by the dark cavity under it), and generally softer * [The practice here recommended, always to draw at least the first grinder of the temporary set, has been but too much followed by the interested or ignorant, who have readily shielded their malpractice under the authority of Hunter's name. The early extraction of any of the temporary teeth to make room for the per- manent ones is rarely necessary, and it is on all accounts to be deprecated, unless the peculiar circumstances of the case imperatively call for it. But the removal of the large molar teeth of the child, in anticipation of a future deficiency of room, is so obviously uncalled for, and such a wanton interference with the usual process of nature, that we cannot but wonder at its being proposed as a general rule, even were there no positive evils to be apprehended from it: but this is not all; not only does the premature removal of the temporary molares endanger the perfect formation of the bicuspides which succeed them, by the forcible laceration of the connecting cord before described, but, if it take place before the permanent teeth are ready to fall into their ultimate situation, the jaw will contract as the child grows, and the second set of teeth will be forced into an irregular position, from permanent want of room. These arguments hold good against the too early removal of any of the deciduous teeth.]
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