The Cerebral Origin of Dental Decay.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1797, 12 January 1884, Page 2 (Supplement)

The Cerebral Origin of Dental Decay.

Habd-working students foroe the growth of their intolleotnal capacity at the expense of their teeth. At all events that is the belief of Drs. Sitherwood and Hanl&n, -who have written on this matter in a recent number of the Journ. dc Medec. et de Ghir. Prat. It iB said that the teeth undergo a rapid alteration in students who labor long, and that on the cessation of the hard work the dental disease dies away. We' are quite prepared to admit that there may be seme truth in these assertions. The teeth have been known to booome loose and drop out apparently as a direct consequence of that protean disease, tabes dorsalis. But it is probable that even truthful Nature will be found to draw the line at the wholesale accusation of her nervous system. Why, we Bhould have thought! that the dental arches were as much without the pale of action of the muoh impeached mental organs as the nails and the skin. ' We have not heard or read whether the epithelial desquamation or the rate of growth of hails is more rapid or more perverted in beings of much cerebral action, as compared with those of their {fellows who work less with their quiet brains. Explanations of this alleged faot concerning the teeth have been mentioned by a rec«nt writer in L 1L 1 Union Medicate. It is thought that the brain, v[hen overworked, steals all the phosphates, and leaves none for the teeth, or else that a deterioration of the general hoalth is brought about by the excessive study. Now, ifc is certainly a matter for consideration whether exoessive menial work per se is capable of inducing serious disease. Side by side VUb. natural mental life there probably goes, on more or less unhealthy action, which bears pretty much the same relation to the former as the latter does to the friction on a steam engine. What is frletion in the engine is anxiety or worry in the man. Ifc is ■ the friotion which destroys the physical basis of the engine, and it is the anxiety that wears out the material structure of the man. ' So, then, all cerebral aolion is accompanied by the inevitable residue of anxiety or whatever else we chose to call it, but this residue may be lessened by various oiroumatanoes, and may be augmented by many conditions ; and bo it is that of two men of equal original health and equal original powers, but of dissimilar environment, the one succumbs because the heat of frictional anxiety has consumed him, the other lives longer because the obstacles to his vital acceptation of the first lay* of motion have been reduced to a minimum. — Lancet.