Page 160 - My FlipBook

;

144 THE TREATMENT OF TEETH

rampant decay, bad health, or what may be called
the foolishness and restlessness of youth. It is
surprising how these oxyphosphate cements will
save teeth when almost everything else, except
gutta-percha, fails—and gutta-percha will not stand
long if subjected to the force of mastication. A
competent authority has placed small value on
cement fillings as savers of the teeth just when the
circumstances for saving them are unpropitious
but the experience of the writer is that if the
decay can be removed from the walls, the margins
moderately well prepared, the cavity sterilised, and
the filling kept from moisture until it is properly
packed and trimmed, a recurrence of decay will
rarely take place at the margins until the filling is
considerably worn or dissolved away. The principal
use for cement fillings will always be in front teeth,
chiefly because the majority of patients will not
come up for regular inspection, and recurrences
of decay that are solely due to neglect in this
respect compel the use of amalgam (with or
without a lining of cement, as may be thought
good) in many cavities in back teeth, which an
operator who was assured of complete control of
his patient would have preferred to first fill with
cement.
Whenever there is a possibility of a cement filling