Page 365 - My FlipBook

THE EIGHTEENTH CENTL'R)' IMl
' '
''
One ot the important (|iu'sti()iis stiulicd h\ Hunoii t-onctriis tlu- ln(»;iene
to be observt'tl in oicUr to obtain the- developnu-nt ot a trood dentition. On
this question he righth' establishes the principle that h\ giene and dental
proph\laxis should begin from the period of the formation of the milk
teeth. He works out this principle with rigorous logic, and finishes
by tracing the hvgiene of the mother during pregnanc\ , ot the woman
(be she mother or nurse) during the nursing period, and ot the nursling
as well.
As to the accidents of first dentition, Bunon sets forth a highlv scientific
opinion, fullv coinciding with the ideas of modern writers, that is, that
dentition is not the sole cause, nor even the principal cause, of such
accidents, but simply a cooperating cause. He made the observation
that in healthy infants, children of^eaflth}' parents and nursed by healthy
women, the time of teething is gotten over without difficult\-, while
serious accidents occur frequenth' in weak and sickl}' children not brought
up and nourished according to hygienic principles, or born, as not often
happens, with special hereditary predispositions.
One of Bunon's merits is that"bf having attributed to the first teeth all
the importance they really have, and ot having insisted on the necessity
of attentively curing their maladies. He also drew attention to the
dangers that ma\- result from the eventual persistence ot the first teeth at
the epoch of the second dentition, or from the persistence ot their roots
after the destruction of the crown by caries. These roots, he says, by
their contact with the neighboring permanent teeth ma\ infect them,
and cause them to decay.
Bunon's researches into the development of the teeth enabled him to
describe precisely the position that the various teeth of the second denti-
tion occupy in the jaw with regard to the milk teeth, before these are
shed.
Bunon was, besides, the first author who studied accuratel}' dental hyj)o-
plasia, and it is greatly to his honor that his ideas and observations about
this pathological condition have been accepted and confirmed in substance
by the greater part of the authors who have come atter him, having
remarkable worth even at the present day. According tcj him, this con-
genital defect of the teeth is owing to infantile maladies, such as hereditar\-
syphilis, infantile scurvy, malignant fevers, smallpox, or measles; the
harmful effects of these maladies, however, are limited to the teeth in
progress of development, and have no influence on those that have already
come forth. Erosion, as this defect was termed b\- Bunon, sometimes
affects the first teeth, but is to be found much more tVe(juentl\- in the
second or permanent ones. Those most often affected are the first molars,
and in frequency follow the incisors, the canines, the premolars; the
second and third molars are the most rarely affected.