380 METHOD OF TREATING THE DENTAL PULP 



the tootli afterwards filled with gutta percha, and 

 eventually permanently stopped. 



I frequently employ gutta percha as a temporary 

 filling, in cases where I feel pretty certain there is 

 no discharge from the pulp, on account of its being 

 readily removed should pain come on in the tooth, 

 and because it very often allows a gold filling to 

 be employed when a cement stopping could only 

 be borne at the time the patient is first seen. Its 

 excellent quality of being a non-conductor of heat 

 renders it very valuable. 



There is, I think, little doubt but that calcifi- 

 cation of the pulp takes place more rapidly under 

 an amalgam filling than under any other; what 

 this is due to I have not been able to ascertain. 

 It may be due to its being a good conductor of 

 heat, and by this means acts moderately as an 

 irritant, and thus excites calcification. The diffi- 

 culty of removing it readily from a tooth, and 

 also the circumstance of changes of temperature 

 being readily conveyed through it to a sensitive 

 pulp, prevent its frequent use as a temporary 

 filling. 



As a rule, I have met with the least success 

 when employing this plan where a pulp has been 

 exposed in excavating a carious tooth, and where 

 capping the pulp seems to be the proper mode of 

 treatment. 



I know it would be very useful to give a per- 

 centage of the teeth saved by this process of 



