Page 23 - Craventreatiseonpyorrh00crav

PYORRHOEA ALVEOLARIS. 13 badly congested, maintains relations with the bony wall; the space between the membranes thus separated becomes occu- pied by saliva entering in from the oral cavity, carrying with it in solution and otherwise, various extraneous substances. Other elements emanating from the membranes involved in the sockets are projected directly into the space made by the inflammatory action and resorption referred to; these accumu- lated elements become stagnated and putrefaction and pus fol- low in rapid order. Thus is formed what is called a "pocket," containing pus, and the establishment of definite pathological conditions to which is given the name pyorrhoea alveolaris. PATHOLOGY. The pathology of pyorrhoea alveolaris has never been sat- isfactorily written ; indeed it is difficult to set forth; but from facts appearing in its etiology and observations of the prog- ress of this lesion, it evidently is a culmination of an inflamma- tion affecting the periosteum first about the socket and later within it; sympathetically the pericementum is affected, not congested, but in a form or degree of hyper-nutrition through which calcic infiltration eventuates in the structure of the ce- mentum itself. The final effect of such calcic infiltration is solidification and peripheral obliteration of the little lakes and canals of the corticle structure of the root (obstructive calcification). It is possible that the pericementum may also become acutely but temporarily inflamed because of conditions of environ- ment, but if so it evidently occurs in, .tjje. jnci.pien.t stage of the disease, because, when teeth that are '" pocketed" are ex-