[Posted on October 23rd, 2013 by Cashion Dental]
// Cashion Dental, your dentist in College Station TX, is part of a long history of dental advances. Here in part 2 we will take a look at the newer innovations in dental careFALSE TEETHThanks to modern technology, today's newest false teeth are largely indistinguishable from real teeth. This wasn't always the case. Perhaps the most famous false-toothed American was the first president, George Washington. Popular history gave Washington wooden teeth, though this was not the case. In fact, wooden teeth are impossible; the corrosive effects of saliva would have turned them into mushy pulp before long. As a matter of fact, the first president's false teeth came from a variety of sources, including teeth extracted from human and animal corpses.Despite this seemingly gruesome practice, dental practitioners preceding Washington's time attempted aesthetic restorations. Ancient civilizations used ivory and bone to create new teeth. Unfortunately, this craft was lost until the mid-1800s. Rotten or damaged teeth were simply extracted, and gaps became a way of life. When false teeth were warranted, threads of silk or tightly coiled springs were used to hold the new teeth in place; it wasn't much of an anchor, and teeth had to be removed before eating, lest they literally spring from the wearer's mouth. Additionally, genuine teeth extracted from the living and the dead and set in another's mouth soon rotted. Those who could afford it opted to have new teeth fashioned from ivory, gold or silver. Your dentist in College Station TX hopefully will not do this!It wasn't until 1774 that two Frenchmen, a pharmacist and a dentist, designed a set of porcelain teeth. Steady improvements were made on the teeth, most notably in 1808 when an Italian dentist invented a single porcelain tooth imbedded with a platinum pin. These teeth came to America in 1822, and for the rest of the century dentists and technicians tinkered with the design, fit and feel of the teeth. A breakthrough occurred in 1839 with the discovery of vulcanized rubber, which was used to hold false teeth. Today's dentures are made of either plastic or ceramic. You can receive care for your dentures at your dentist in College Station TX.ANESTHESIAIn the beginning, teeth were removed with a well-placed chisel and a hard swing of a mallet. Thousands of years later, during peaks of the great Greek and Roman civilizations, the chisel-and-mallet method was abandoned in favor of forceps.In the 1790s, a British chemist began to experiment with the use of nitrous oxide as a pain-inhibitor and noted its most famous side effect, laughing. He coined the anesthetic's popular nickname, "laughing gas." During the next 50 years, the gas became very popular. In 1863 the gas was combined with oxygen, becoming a staple of surgical procedures. Soon after the adoption of nitrous oxide, local anesthetics were developed. Many of the alternatives were forms of synthetic drugs, but none were successful until 1905 when a German chemist discovered procaine, which he named Novocain. The anesthetic proved extremely popular with dental professionals, as well as a public relieved at the sound of "painless dentistry." As a leading dentist in College Station TX, we promise your visit will be a pleasant and painless one.
