1. Ya-heou. Gums are red, soft, and swollen, and a fetid and purulent matter exudes from them; the teeth are not painful; if the gums are lanced, blood of a pale red color flows from them in abundance. This malady is to be treated with various internal medicines and sometimes with scarification.
2. Ja-suen. Gums swollen; little by little they are corroded and destroyed by ulceration, which leaves the roots of the teeth bared; the patient has an aversion for hot food; continued pain in the teeth; discharge of purulent and fetid mucus; by the slightest exposure to cold the pain becomes very violent. This affection is to be combated with internal remedies and local treatment (frictions with medicated powders; application of an ointment of very complicated preparation).
3. Tchuen-ya-kan. The gums are painful for a few days; apparition of the root of the tooth; absence of ulceration. Children of five or six years of age are frequently exposed to this malady. The best means of cure consists in the extraction of the tooth. There are, besides, various internal and external remedies prescribed. One of these latter contains verdigris and three other ingredients. Among those to be used internally there is a decoction prepared with twelve different drugs, two of which are mint and rhubarb. The quantity of rhubarb is about seven and one-half grams; therefore, this prescription is certainly intended to act as a purgative.
4. Ya-ting. The right or left gum suddenly swells; a tumor forms of about the size of a grain of sorgo; in the beginning it is red, afterward black; severe pain in the cheek and neck; itching in the cheek; the tumor afterward bursts, giving exit to blood, and becomes black; it ought to be pricked directly (before it opens of itself) with a silver needle; blood of a violet color will flow from it, which should be left free course until it regains its ordinary color. The sufferer has at the same time pains in the stomach, great thirst, abdominal pains, and sometimes even delirium.
5. Ya-jong. Gums swollen and painful, abscess, fever, swollen cheeks; great thirst, and vomiting of a liquid kind; dejections dry. The treatment consists in the methodical use of certain medicines to be used internally, among which is rhubarb. If one neglects to make use of this treatment, an ulceration sets in with discharge of a purulent and sanguine mucus; it is then necessary to rub the part with a medicinal substance called by the Chinese, ping-pang-san. Should the tooth be somewhat loose, it ought to be extracted and the gum rubbed again with the substance just now named.
6. Tso-ma-ya-kan. An illness common to children after the smallpox; ulceration of the gums, which turn black; fetid breath. In certain cases the gums are hard and the mucous membrane of the cheek is also attacked; all the teeth shake; there is flow of blood from the gums, upon which certain spots begin to form that are clearly distinguishable as small holes. These holes must be filled with a particular medicinal substance (named lay-ma-ting-kouei-sse), and, besides, one ought to make use of various other internal and external remedies.
This is a very serious illness. In the case of recovery, the patient ought to abstain from taking any heating aliment for one hundred days.
7. Tsee-kin-tong or tsee-ly-tong. Gums swollen; slight but continuous pain, aggravated by the effort of the wind; the gums become ulcerated little by little, with discharge of purulent and sanguine mucus; and the root of the tooth is afterward seen to be uncovered. This malady is to be treated by means of draughts, pills, mouth washes, and frictions of various kinds.
After the treatise on the maladies referred to above, we find in Dabry’s book a long series of “general remedies for every kind of toothache.” There are about forty of these, and decoctions and powders predominate among them, the latter to be rubbed on the painful spot. Decoctions are the form of medicament most in use among the Chinese. In this list of about forty anti-odontalgic remedies we find as many as eighteen decoctions, seven for internal use, and the others to be employed as mouth washes. Some of the latter are compounded with vinegar instead of with water.
Four remedies of the above list are to be made into a paste and formed into pills, to be applied upon the aching tooth.