WHY TOOTHACHES AND EARACHES

King Country Chronicle, Volume VIII, Issue 654, 25 March 1914, Page 2

WHY TOOTHACHES AND EARACHES

HURT WORSE THAN FATAL DISEAES. There is nothing more mysterious than pain. Why is it that a tiny bit of nerve in a tooth will make you walk the floor all night, while a vital organ may be in the la3t extremities without causing you a single tinge? Dr Otto Veraguth, of Zurich, Switzerland, has just explained some of the curiosities of pain. An insignificant bit of inflammation is able to make an outcry out of all proportion to its seriousness when in a tooth, for the reason that the nerve is surrounded by bone. If a tooth were soft the inflamed nerve could swell without being pressed by the surrounding tissue, and nobody would pray any attention to a toothache. An earache is considered to be even worse than an ulcerated tooth. The explanation is the same. The inner ear is a closed box, and inflammation causes pressure, and pressure causes unendurable pain. Most people think that kidney trouble is indicated by a pain in the back. The truth is thac kindly trouble is practically never indicated in that way. A man may have diseased kidneys and also an ache in the small of the back, but they have no more connection than if be had a broken leg. Most of the vital organs suffer in silence, sending no direct messages of pain to the brain, but they do complain in roundabout ways, such as headaches.

Headache sufferers think the pain inside their heads, in the brain. The brain as a matter of fact, is insensible to pain. When the scalp and skull have been cut through, a needle may be stuck into the brain substance without the slightest suffering. Headaches are inflammations of the nerves in the skull, and, as they are buried in cracks of the skull, they are in much the same condition as ear and tooth nerves. Trouble in an organ is often revealed by a sensation of pain in son-e nearby portion of the skin. There is nothing tha matter with the skin, but the organ having no way of complaining to the brain, gets its neighbour to protest. The headache following over-indul-gence in alcoholic drink comes not from the brain, nor from the nerves of the skull, bat from the spine. Alcohol is one of the few substances that can work its way into the spinal fluid. It at first stimulates the cord and gives us pleasant sensations of exhilaration later it causes pressure of the spinal fluid on the cord itself. This pressure registers in the brain as a headache. "The morning after" cold towels should be applied, not to the head, but tj the spine.