Page 376 - My FlipBook
P. 376
372
directed, the alveolus from whence the blood usually issues,
may be stopped with a piece of cork, or the tooth itself may
be returned until a slight inflammation takes place, and then
removed. Blisters may be applied to the angle of the jaw,
or behind the ear, &c. I will present the reader with an
account of a fatal case of this kind, taken from the Dentiste
Observateur.
*A person living in Paris called upon me to extract a ca-
nine tooth for him. On examining his mouth, I thought that
this man was attacked with the scurvy; but this did not
seem to me sufficient to hinder the person from having his
tooth extracted ; much less would he have consented to it,
on account of the pain which this tooth gave him. After
the tooth was extracted, it did not appear to me that it bled
more profusely than is customary to do after similar opera-
tions. In the mean while, the following night I was called
upon to see the patient, who had continued to bleed ever
since he left me. I employed for stopping this haemorrhage,
the agaric of the oak bark which I commonly used with suc-
cess. The following day I was again sent for, the bleeding
still continued. After having disburdened the mouth of all
the lint pledgets which I used for making compression at the
place where the blood appeared to come from, I made the
patient take some mouthfuls of water to clean his mouth of
all the clots of blood with which it was filled : I perceived
then that the blood came no more from the place where I
had extracted the tooth, but from the gums ; there was not
one single place in the whole mouth from whence blood did
not issue. I called in then the physician, who ordered sev-
eral bleedings in succession to each other, besides astrin-
* Le Dentiste Observateur, par H. G. Courtois, Paris, 1775.