The Monthly Review of Dental Surgery, No. VIII. October, 1880. Vol. I. / The Journal of the British Dental Association

by Various

3. The reading and discussion of papers on Dental Surgery and Mechanics.

4. The cultivation of a generous professional spirit amongst practitioners throughout the district.

With respect to the first object, I think the purport of the Act is so clear that it requires but few remarks from me. It is impossible to draw any definite line where the help of an unqualified person must cease and that of the duly qualified practitioner commence. Any one who dresses a wound or a bruise, or reduces a dislocation, practises surgery, and no one could for a moment imagine that a law would ever be passed to prevent his doing so; and in like manner, we could not expect that the legislature would ever allow the drawing of a tooth or any other similar operation to be made a penal action, although the person so doing may be said to be practising Dentistry; but as soon as any one endeavours to make the public believe he is a qualified practitioner, by assuming the title of Dentist or any other name implying the possession of the Dental diploma, so soon he becomes amenable to the law; the act thus guaranteeing to the public, that for the future, any one who claims the professional title shall of necessity have obtained the necessary qualification. Any person, or any number of persons, who may wish to put the act in force in any particular case can do so, but before taking action it will be necessary to obtain the sanction of the Medical Council. This at first sight may seem to be an unnecessary precaution, yet I think on further consideration you will admit that it is a very wise provision, as it entirely prevents the possibility of any one being proceeded against from personal pique or any other improper motive; and if in any case it is thought desirable that a person’s name should be removed from the register, all that is necessary is to collect sufficient reliable evidence, and transmit it to the central board in London, who will bring the matter before the Medical Council, the only body by whom such action can be taken. And in cases where these proceedings may be necessary, I am sure they can be carried out without earning for ourselves the opprobrium of acting as spies or professional police, which some have already been willing to assign to us.

With regard to the second object of the Society, we must all feel that the interests of the profession will at times require the careful consideration of its members, and necessitate the existence of some organised body which shall be able to act with the authority of the bulk of its members, and for this, no better scheme can be devised than the one we are now so much interested in—the formation of a central society, with recognised branches in the more distant parts of the country, constituting an organisation by which the feeling of the majority of the profession may at any time be ascertained on any question that may arise bearing on the well being of the profession.

In the third object, “The reading and discussion of papers on Dental Surgery and Mechanics,” the surgery you will notice is placed first, and justly so, as the higher branch; though in early times, and I fear even to a more recent date, the order in importance was more frequently reversed in practice. The mere mechanical calling of former times—for in its infancy Dentistry was little else—has now been developed into a profession and gained admission within the sacred portals of the College in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and it is for the present and future generations to prove by the exercise of their highest mental as well as mechanical faculties, that the profession is worthy of the position which has been accorded to it.

It has been noticed by those who most frequently attend the meetings of our speciality, that papers on mechanical subjects are more easily procured, and often prove more attractive than those on surgical subjects, but this will no doubt become less as the educational facilities of the present day are brought to bear more and more on the whole body of the profession. Surely the preservation of the natural organs is of far more importance and value to the patient than the substitution of others, however efficiently supplied.

What should we think of the surgeon who allowed himself to be deterred from directing all his energies to the preservation and restoration to health, of a diseased or injured limb, by the thought that an artificial substitute could be provided for it. No! No! Whatever our politics may be let our surgery be conservative. Far be it from me to appear to undervalue any branch of my profession, for no one can have been long in practice without having experienced the well earned gratification derived from noticing the relief from pain, and in many instances the perfect restoration to health, that follows the substitution of efficient members in the place of useless and diseased ones; but far greater is the credit and higher the appreciation of the patient, when the diseased natural organs themselves can be preserved and restored to a state of efficiency; and how great are the facilities for so doing in the present day, compared with the early reminiscences of many of our older brethren. All of us who were fortunate enough to hear the interesting paper read before the General Meeting of the Society in August last, must have been forcibly struck with the contrast between the paucity and quality of the instruments there mentioned, and the appliances of the present day. What would have been the feelings—I might almost say the bewilderment of the practitioner therein described, could he have been transported into one of the large depôts with which we are so familiar. The numerous and beautifully adapted instruments for the variety of operations unknown in those days. The admirably adjusted forces for each form of tooth, the endless variety of excavators and pluggers, the wonderfully delicate nerve extractors, the rubber dam and its adjustments, the saliva pump, the electric mallet, the improvement in our chairs, and that greatest of all boons, both to patient and operator, the Morrison engine, the name of the inventor of which valuable instrument, ought to be indelibly inscribed in letters of gold in the Archives of Dentistry, to say nothing of the application of vulcanite and celluloid, and the many ingenious appliances for the workshop. Surely these should lead us to value the benefits we enjoy, and teach us to strive to use them to the best of our ability, not influenced by the thought of self-glorification in attempting to surpass all others, in the performance of this or that brilliant operation, but ever remembering that the ultimate aim of all our efforts should be the increased amount of good which we are thereby enabled to accomplish for the benefit of our suffering fellow-creatures.

Although the Transactions of the Odontological Society contain a very voluminous and valuable collection of papers bearing on one speciality, there still remain numerous subjects and modes of operating which may be made productive of profitable discussion. Such are the replantation of teeth now attracting so much attention, the erosion of the surfaces of the teeth of which so little is known in the present day. The various improvements in the materials for filling, and amongst a variety of subjects, far too numerous to be mentioned here, the startling announcement of the so-called New Departure Creed.

As this last is a subject which I think we all feel greatly interested in, and also bears on the branch of Dentistry which we are now considering, I will venture a few remarks on some of the articles of the accepted and new departure creeds as tabulated in the Dental Cosmos.

I am not aware that the so-called accepted creed has been the recognised standard of practice in this country. The doctrine that gold, and nothing but gold, should be used for permanent fillings, has certainly been extensively promulgated by those of our Transatlantic brethren who have settled in this country; and I cannot but look upon this new departure, as the natural reaction which might be expected to follow the over anxiety to build up large adhesive gold fillings, on fragments of weak and often disorganized teeth, totally unsuited for such an operation; but until I can see some stronger reason than has been hitherto adduced by the advocates of this new departure, I must, in any case suitable for a good gold filling, confess my unwillingness to abandon for any other of the fillings now in use, a material that we know from past experience is capable, when judiciously applied, of preserving and restoring to a state of efficiency, in some cases for a period of twenty years or even for a much longer time, teeth which otherwise would have been lost in about the same number of months. For the efficient use of this material much must of course depend on the manipulative ability of the operator, but it has often seemed to me a matter of doubt, whether, in the case of those large adhesive gold fillings, the patient has received an equivalent for the tedious and necessarily expensive operation that has been undergone.