The Teeth
THE TEETH - DENTIFRICES - THE BREATH - TOOTHACHE - TOOTH- ACHE REMEDIES THE TEETH Good Teeth.-Modern dentistry has greatly assisted in causing the public to realize the value of a set of good teeth, but much still remains to be done in this direction. Medical inspectors in the public schools large cities report that a very large percentage of school children have poor teeth due to the ignorance or neglect of parents. Good teeth are necessary to health, speech, and beauty.
From the standpoint of health, it must be remembered that the process of digestion begins in the mouth.
This fact is the basis of the system of hygiene known as Fletcherism.
The originator of this system, after having become a chronic dyspeptic, cured himself at an advanced age by attention to two principles: never eating when not hungry, and chewing food until all the taste is chewed out of it and it disappears without conscious effort of swallowing. The importance of this last is due to the fact that the saliva of the mouth has the property of converting starchy foods into sugar, thus aiding digestion. And the further fact that food finely divided by proper chewing is more readily acted upon by the gastric juice of the stomach. Good teeth are, of course, necessary to good chewing. If any of the teeth are lost, part of the food is likely to be swallowed without being properly chewed, and the ill effects are no less certain because they are not always immediately noticed or attributed to the true source.
The teeth play an important part in pronunciation, and their loss often causes a difficulty in speech which, in the case of children, at the age when they are learning to pronounce their words, may have the effect of retarding the child's mental development. Apertures caused by the loss of teeth, or irregularities due to the permanent teeth coming in unevenly, are life-long disfigurements. For all of these reasons, intelligent and painstaking attention to the teeth is perhaps the most important single subject in connection with the toilet.
Bad Teeth.- Decayed teeth showing cavities in the crown, or having decayed roots, are not only painful, offensive in appearance and in contaminating the breath, but frequently are the direct causes of serious disturbances of digestion. The temperature of the mouth is about 96° F. or considerably above that of ordinary summer weather. The humidity of the mouth is, of course, high.
Under these conditions, experience teaches that fresh meat and other organic matter will decay very rapidly. Hence, particles of food lodged in cavities or between the teeth, if not removed, decay and afford breeding places for the bacteria of filth diseases. These are swallowed with food and upon occasion of any irritation of the digestive tract, find lodgment and give rise to indigestion and other troubles. These substances also contaminate the breath and become highly offensive to others. So that absolute cleanliness is an imperative duty that everyone owes to himself and also to his neighbor.
Moreover, if any of the teeth are unsound and painful the adjacent teeth are not likely to be used in the process of chewing, and the consequence is imperfect digestion. The remedy for these conditions is twofold: personal cleanliness and other hygienic measures, and prompt treatment by a good dentist as soon as the first symptoms of decay appear.
Structure of the Teeth. - The outer structure of the tooth consists of three parts: the root, which is contained in the bony substance of the jaw; the neck, which is contained in the gum, and the crown, which is the exposed portion. In the interior of each tooth is a cavity which contains the pulp, a pale-red soft substance composed of nerves and blood vessels.
The surface of the root of the tooth is covered by a thin membrane called the periosteum, which, when the teeth decay, frequently becomes inflamed and is one of the causes of toothache.
Infant's Teeth. - Fasten a bit of absorbent cotton on the point of an orange stick or a piece of soft pine wood. Dip it in a 5 per cent solu tion of boric acid, and with this cleanse the milk teeth of children as soon as they appear.
Or wind a piece of cotton around the finger and dip it in a 5 per cent solution of boric acid or a dilute solution of listerine. As soon as the full set of milk teeth, consisting of twenty teeth, or five on each half of each jaw, have all come in, a soft toothbrush should be used daily. Otherwise the milk, which forms such an important part of a child's diet, will be deposited between the teeth and become transformed into lactic acid. This tends to destroy the enamel and cause decay.
Two important facts regarding children's teeth are often overlooked, and much mischief results. One is that the first permanent teeth usually appear about the sixth or seventh year. The other is that several of the milk teeth are retained until about the twelfth year. This overlapping of the two sets of teeth makes early and constant care imperative. The first permanent teeth must, of course, have attention if they are to be preserved, and the milk teeth that are retained must be kept in good order to insure proper digestion during the period of most rapid growth of the child.