A practical guide to operations on the teeth : to which is prefixed a historical sketch of the rise and progress of dental surgery / by James Snell, dentist.

  • Snell, James, 1976-
Date:
1831
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: A practical guide to operations on the teeth : to which is prefixed a historical sketch of the rise and progress of dental surgery / by James Snell, dentist. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by University of Bristol Library. The original may be consulted at University of Bristol Library.

    193/232 (page 171)
    may be used in connexion with an operation apparently so trifling. Where a carious tooth will not bear the pressure of an instrument introduced into the cavity, the first object must be to ascertain the extent to which the disease has advanced ; whether the pain arises solely from the spongy decomposed bone of the tooth touching the lining membrane when pressed, or whether that membrane has itself become more or less dis- eased. It is not uncommon to find a tooth, on the introduction of an instrument, so tender as not to bear the slightest pressure without giving intense pain, and yet on the whole of the carious ])art being removed, no tenderness will remain, particularly if the cavity is washed well out with repeated locks of soft cotton saturated with spirit of camphor. Where this desirable result follows the removal of the caries, it is of course to be presumed that the lining mem- brane is not diseased. The tooth, therefore, should have the cavity carefully dried out and stopped in the manner already described. Too generally, however, the disease is suf- fered to go on until the lining membrane has become affected. It is, perhaps, under