Dental anaesthesia: painless tooth extraction by congelation.

  • Quinton, J. Richard.
Date:
1856
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Dental anaesthesia: painless tooth extraction by congelation. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    cism would not allow of a stipulation for more than one of the teeth to be removed. He was (piite sure that one extraction would be enough. Undaunted by the fears engendered by scepti- cism, I took the opportunity of freezing both the teeth at the same time. When the first was extracted without even a passing cloud over his features, I told him that the other was also frozen. He immediately said, “ Out with it, if you jolease, for I have no feeling.’ He afterwards had a third removed, with equal success; and then agreed with me, that an appeal to experience was the best antidote to scepticism. A somewhat more humorous gentleman waited iq)on me not long since,—a true representative of a different class of sceptics from the former, the reductio ad ahsurdam predominating over rational consideration of possible facts. He was a tall, stout, powerfully built, plethoric gentleman. Upon entering my consultation room, he said he had come from Paris to have a tooth taken out, and into his waistcoat pocket without knoiumg it. Confident how light ridicule would weigh, balanced against experience, I proceeded with the case. Insen- sibility was secured by the cold ; the tooth was extracted ; and my sarcastic patient acknowledged the success of the operation in the not unusual words—“Is it really out, sir?” The scornful