Page 193 - My FlipBook

the amount of lime salts between teeth that decay rapidly ;
and teeth immune to decay.
^^It has been widely claimed that there was a great dif-
ference in the amount of lime salts in the teeth of children
and in the teeth of adults ; that the teeth of children had
not become sufficiently hardened, and should not be filled
with metal because of their lack of density, and that as the
person grew older the teeth became harder. This was very
carefully looked into. I had a large number of teeth from
children and from persons of different ages, and I grouped
them. Those under fifteen years old I placed in one group;
from fifteen to tw^enty in a second group, from twenty
to thirty in a third group ; from thirty to forty in a
fourth group, and so on up, each ten years afterward.
In this examination I found there was an increase in the
lime salts with increasing age : In that group of fifteen
and younger, including permanent teeth, down to the age
of seven years—I had two first molars that were extracted
at the age of seven, and of those extracted at the age of
eight, nine and ten quite a good many—the difference be-
tween the amount of lime salts in these and in the group
between forty and fifty years old was 1.43 per cent. That
was held pretty closely throughout the examination, show-
ing apparently an actual increase in the lime salts of older
persons above that of the child. But see how little it is
only 1.43 per cent; not enough, gentlemen, for us to appre-
ciate it at all in operations upon the teeth; not enough
upon which to base any difference whatever in the treat-
ment of the tooth of the child and in the treatment of the
tooth of the adult. Now, don't understand me to say that
there should be no difference in the treatment of the child
and the adult; don't understand me to say that for a mo-
ment; but only to say that so far as the calcified tissues of
the tooth are concerned there should be no difference what-
ever. But remember always that when you have a little
child in your hands you have conditions otherwise than the
calcific matter in the tooth that are very different from the
conditions which you have in the adult ; you have a differ-
ent constitution of the nervous system to deal with , you
have a difference in ability to bear pain to deal with you have
;
a difference in self-control to deal with, and these go to make

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