Toothpaste

“ Great care is required in compounding dentifrices and mouth-waters, and special attention must be paid to the correct selection of the material. The substances used must be chemically pure, and no caustic or sharp or grating materials, such as pumice, sand, ossa sepiæ, etc., should be employed, they destroying the enamel of the teeth.
The coloring substances used to give the dentifrices and mouth-waters a pleasing appearance should under no condition be injurious or poisonous, such as, for instance, brilliant rosa, cinnabar, aniline, chrome yellow, picric acid, etc. ”

“ In other words, if you sit down to a meal after chewing gum for two or three hours, the saliva that you mix with your food will not have the normal digestive elements. One might say that the "strength" of the saliva has been lost while chewing gum.
If your teeth are decayed the offending members should be removed or the cavities filled. It is always wise to retain every tooth you can until extraction is practically compulsory. Decayed teeth should be filled promptly. As long as a tooth can be filled it should not be extracted. A good dentist should be consulted at frequent intervals. ”

“ Decayed teeth may be filled, according to Valescus, to satisfy four different indications: To calm or prevent pain, to prevent any further spreading of the caries, to kill the worms, and to sweeten the breath. He advises that the carious cavities should be filled up with powdered nigella, pepper, myrrh, salt, and theriac; or else with pyrethrum, gum ammoniac, and opium; or else with celery seeds pulverized, opium, and hyoscyamus; or with the cast-off skin of serpents boiled in vinegar; or with gallia and cyperus. ”

“ A tooth-pick will sometimes be found necessary in the removal of particles of food that are inaccessible to the brush. Metallic tooth-picks injure the enamel, and should not be used. Those made of ivory, or the common goose-quill, are unobjectionable. The brush should be used, not only after each meal, but the last thing at night and the first thing in the morning. This will prevent the accumulation of tartar, which so commonly incrusts neglected teeth. If suffered to remain, it gradually accumulates, presses upon the gums, and destroys their health. ”

“ Dirty teeth also often cause the breath to smell; and hence the use of the tooth-brush should be a daily habit. Occasionally rinsing out the mouth with a little clean water to which a few drops of solution of chloride of lime, or of chloride of soda, has been added, is often an effective method. Mouth-washes of Condy’s fluid, and also of carbolic acid, both very greatly diluted, form useful remedies; as do also chlorate of potash and tannic acid in the form of mouth-washes. As a tooth-powder, fresh-burnt charcoal, and particularly areca-nut charcoal, is without comparison the best. ”

“ As the products of inflammation can not escape, they collect and work their way downward, where they produce the most painful inflammation of the roots and the periosteum. The chief object of the rational treatment of caries of the teeth consists in the removal of every particle of carious substance out of the diseased tooth and the protection of the sound dentine that has been exposed against external injurious influences by covering it with a fine substance which is not attacked by acids—gutta-percha, cement, or gold. ”

“ Never pick the teeth with a pin or needle. The biting off of thread, finger nails, and other hard material may crack the enamel. It may also be softened and eaten away by acid formed where food remains about a tooth. For this reason a quill or wooden pick or piece of tough thread, called dental floss, should be used to clear the teeth of food after each meal. Slimy matter collects over the whole surface of the teeth, and is likely to cause decay in spots unless it is cleaned off night and morning with brush and water. ”

“ As to tooth powders or pastes to be used with the brush, the simplest are the best. Plain camphorated chalk, with or without a little finely powdered pumice stone or burnt hartshorn, is a popular and excellent tooth powder. It is capable of exerting sufficient friction under the brush to ensure pearly whiteness of the teeth without injuring the enamel, whilst the camphor in it tends to destroy the animalcula in the secretions of the mouth, whose skeletons or remains constitute, as we shall presently see, the incrassation popularly called “tartar.” ”

“ Why Candy and other Sweets cause the Teeth to Decay.—A sour substance called acid usually starts the decay of a tooth by eating through the enamel. Germs change sugar and other sweets into an acid. The acid is not made at once. An hour or more is needed for the germs to grow to form the acid. If, after eating sweet foods, the mouth is well cleaned, no acid will be formed. Sugar and candy do not, therefore, spoil the teeth unless it is left sticking about them. ”

“ The famousest ware in England, which never fails to cure the tooth-ache in half an hour, price one shilling the bottle. Likewise a powder for cleansing the teeth, which makes them as ivory without wearing them, and without prejudice to the gums, one shilling the box. Also two sorts of water for curing the scurry in the gums; though they are eaten away to the bottom, it will heal them, and cause them to grow as firm as ever, very safe, without mercury, or any unwholesome spirit. ”

“ Dental caries will occur to everyone's mind as a disease possibly due to bacteria. As a matter of fact, probably acids (due to acid secretion and acid fermentation) and micro-organisms are two of the chief causes of decay of teeth. Defects in the enamel, inherent or due to injury, retention of débris on and around the teeth, and certain pathological conditions of the secretion of the mouth are predisposing causes, which afford a suitable nidus for putrefactive bacteria. The large quantity of bacteria which a decayed tooth contains is easily demonstrated. ”

“ A most excellent dentifrice, which cleans and preserves the teeth, is made by mixing together two ounces of brown rappee snuff, one of powder of bark, and one ounce and a half of powder of myrrh. When the gums are inclined to shrink from the teeth, cold water should be used frequently to rinse the mouth; a little alum, dissolved in a pint of water, a tea-cup full of sherry wine, and a little tincture of myrrh or bark, will be found extremely beneficial in restoring the gums to a firm and healthy state. This receipt was given verbally by one of our first dentists. ”

“ It is advisable to inform the patient of the possibility of pain following the extraction of a tooth, especially after periodontitis, and in all cases where a large number of teeth have been extracted a mouth-wash [20] should be prescribed; for, even if there is no pain, it will prevent the discharge from the sockets of the teeth undergoing putrefactive changes.
In pain due to necrosis of the socket deodorant antiseptic injections must be used, while in extensive laceration of the soft and hard parts an anodyne mouth-wash [21] may be tried. ”

“ Tooth-paste or odontine, No. 2.—Carbonate of magnesium and sugar of milk each 2 lbs., precipitated carbonate of calcium 4 lbs., prepared chalk 10 lbs., sugar 4 lbs. dissolved in water 5 quarts, best soap-powder 2 lbs., alizarin, as coloring matter, 7 ozs., peppermint oil 101⁄2 ozs., clove oil 83⁄4 ozs.
This paste is prepared in the same manner as No. 1, [Pg 278] only the proportion of water has to be taken into consideration. To prevent the mass from becoming too soft, the water should be very gradually added. ”

“ The tooth pushes thru the gum; and as it goes by, the cells at the sides of the pocket and on top plaster it with a coating of enamel. Therefore, as most of us find out to our cost, this enamel once destroyed, can never grow again. Once clear of the pocket where it was formed, it has to last us the rest of our lives; and little boys and girls who don’t keep their teeth clean when they are young, have to put up with something not nearly so good when they are grown up. ”

“ When the teeth are already tolerably clean, and not encrusted with what is called tartar, a soft brush is always to be preferred, as risking the enamel less. Hard brushes and gritty powders ruin more teeth than all the sugar and lime in the world. Charcoal is undoubtedly a good substitute for a tooth-powder; but it is to be objected to as leaving black furrows in the gums, which even much washing fails to remove in any reasonable time. ”

“ Thus, as facilitating the eruption of teeth, he recommends among other remedies the rubbing of the gums with a mixture of honey, fresh butter, hare’s brains, and oil of lilies, or with the fat of an old cock, dog’s milk, and pig’s brains. Against the disorders and dangers of the teething period he also advises rubbing the nape of the infant’s neck, the shoulders, the back, and the lower limbs, always taking care, however, to rub from above downward, thus offering opposition to the flow of humors toward the upper parts of the body. ”

“ It is necessary, therefore, to avoid acting like the ignorant and foolish barbers, who in their temerity do not observe any of the above-mentioned rules, and therefore very often cause the patients great injuries, the least among which is the breaking of the tooth, the root being left in the socket, or else the taking away, together with the tooth, of a piece of the maxillary bone, as the author often happened to see. After the extraction the patient must rinse his mouth with wine, or with vinegar and salt. ”

“ In certain cases he also proceeds to scarification of the gums, or else he detaches them all around from the tooth, by means of a special instrument called a pericharacter. It would often turn out useful to apply to an aching tooth a grain of incense warmed by the fire and wrapped in a thin piece of cloth, or to press between the teeth, where the pain is situated, several pieces of cloth, in succession, in which some powder of incense has been wrapped, and which are dipped into hot oil before being used. ”

“ The habit of caring for the teeth daily, and if possible after each
meal, should be established early in life.
Those who have neglected to do so should lose no time in consulting a
reputable dentist, and then persistently caring for their teeth day by
day. Children especially should be taught to use the tooth-brush and
some reliable dentifrice. The more pleasant the preparation the easier
it will be to teach them its daily use. A fragrant, refreshing liquid is
recommended, as it is a mouth wash as well as a tooth cleanser. ”

“ In some cases, the odor arising from caries is combined with that of the stomach. If the mouth be well rinsed with a teaspoonful of the solution of the chloride in a tumbler of water, the bad odor of the teeth will be removed.
Rye Tooth Powder.—Rye contains carbonate of lime, carbonate of magnesia, oxide of iron, manganese, and silica, all suitable for application to the teeth. Therefore, a fine tooth powder is made by burning rye, or rye bread, to ashes, and grinding it to powder by passing the rolling-pin over it. Pass the powder through a sieve, and use. ”

“ The pain resulting from advanced caries of the deciduous teeth, owing to the difficulties encountered in controlling the patient, is not easily treated; moreover, the injurious impressions thus made on the system of the child abide through life. There is no doubt hundreds of thousands of teeth are unnecessarily extracted each year, and then drugs are given with a view of curing the patient of the disorders of digestion and other abnormal conditions which follow, and which in turn arise from imperfect mastication of food, verily for the want of teeth. ”

“ As for ourselves, though we be accused of being controlled by one permanent notion, truth compels us to say that the employment of our ethereal alluminous paste has enabled us to preserve the teeth of our patients, even when these organs were attacked with most intense inflammations. Its sedative and extraordinary anti-spasmodic quality does not fail to triumph over the inflammatory erytheism of the dental nervous system and its appendages to such an extent that all pain and all irritation cease at the end of some days, sometimes on the next day. ”

“ A mixture of caramel and cochineal coloring, N. F., gives an agreeable red color for saponaceous tooth washes. It is not permanent, however.
Variations of this formula follow:
Beat up the soap with the glycerine; dissolve the oils in the alcohol and add to the soap and glycerine. Stir well until the soap is completely dissolved.
If the wash is intended simply as an elixir for sweetening the breath, the following preparation, resembling the celebrated eau de botot, will be found very desirable:
Care must be taken not to confound the oil of cedar tops with the oil of cedar wood. ”

“ Although the dentine is not as unchangeable as enamel, but manifests, by becoming firmer or softer, that it is not quite uninfluenced by tissue-changes, yet its caries is not an irritative process that the dentine takes an active part in, but a passive process, and consequently the removal of all diseased portions and the protection of the non-carious part of the tooth suffices to stay the morbid process completely. ”

“ It is well to use a good antiseptic mouth wash and throat gargle regularly and to see a dentist at least twice a year, so that he can detect the first signs of tooth decay or gum infection and prevent serious trouble which often has its beginnings in the mouth. ”