Posts tagged pain

Portrayals of Dentistry in the 17th Century

I had the privilege to get a chipped filling extracted from my gingiva and to have the filling re-done earlier today, in a process that was about as fun as, well, getting an enamel chip dug out of your gums and then getting a large filling right over the seriously-inflamed gumline.

Of course, as much as I piss and moan about how much it hurt, my pain is nothing compared to people in the 17th century. Well, at least according to the artists of the era. There seems to have been a particular interest in the pain inflicted by the dentists and barber-surgeons of the time, and the fascination of the people around the “patient” in the apparent misery they’re going through.

Dentists were largely seen as below barber-surgeons until the very late 1600s-early 1700s, when one Pierre Fauchard took massive steps towards legitimization of the profession.

Top: “The Dentist” Gerard van Honthorst, 1622.
Center Left: “The Quackdoctor” Jan Steen, 1651.
Center Right: “The Extraction of Tooth” Gerard Dou, ca. 1630-1635.
Bottom: “The Toothpuller” Caravaggio (probable), ca. 1608-1610.

wga.hu

Medical Term of the Season: Sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia Meaning: Cold-induced neuralgia originating in the palate, aka Ice-Cream Headache, aka Brain Freeze Image: Hard and soft palatine surfaces in relation to the throat. Gray’s Anatomy, 1885 ed.

Medical Term of the Season: Sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia

Meaning: Cold-induced neuralgia originating in the palate, aka Ice-Cream Headache, aka Brain Freeze

Image: Hard and soft palatine surfaces in relation to the throat. Gray’s Anatomy, 1885 ed.

not a question-just a comment! i am not sure if it's because i am rather tired at the moment, but i giggled a little at your last post regarding amputation and the lack of expression (i.e. sheer terror, pain, etc) on the faces of the amputees. i think i need to go to sleep now. — Asked by twirlyourbirdie

We’re wimps these days when it comes to pain; the only indication to “pain” old medieval and Islamic texts made was to “have the patient avert their eyes”. I’m sure it was just as painful, but they’re still amusing in how they dealt with it…

That’s a medieval nasal polyp surgery…smile for the painter, patient!

“The Gout”  1799 caricature of “the disease of kings”, by James Gillray. At this point in history, the cause of gout still wasn’t known, and it was only known that men who drank alcohol and partook in oily fish (oily fish like sardines were not cheap!) were far more prone to suffer than anyone else. But! The gout could strike anyone. Young, old, women, men, teetotalers, drunks…anyone. And it still can. Some people are simply unfortunate in the cards of physiology. 

“The Gout” 

1799 caricature of “the disease of kings”, by James Gillray. At this point in history, the cause of gout still wasn’t known, and it was only known that men who drank alcohol and partook in oily fish (oily fish like sardines were not cheap!) were far more prone to suffer than anyone else.

But! The gout could strike anyone. Young, old, women, men, teetotalers, drunks…anyone. And it still can. Some people are simply unfortunate in the cards of physiology. 

Fig 1. Acute marginal peridontitisFig 2. Acute apical peridontitisFig 3. Acute circumscribed peridontitisFig 4. Acute unilateral peridontitisFig 5. Acute unilateral peridontitisFig 6. Chronic diffuse purulent peridontitis  Atlas and Textbook of Dentistry including Diseases of the Mouth. Dr. Gustav Preiswerk, 1906. Translated and edited by George W. Warren.

Fig 1. Acute marginal peridontitis
Fig 2. Acute apical peridontitis
Fig 3. Acute circumscribed peridontitis
Fig 4. Acute unilateral peridontitis
Fig 5. Acute unilateral peridontitis
Fig 6. Chronic diffuse purulent peridontitis 

Atlas and Textbook of Dentistry including Diseases of the Mouth. Dr. Gustav Preiswerk, 1906. Translated and edited by George W. Warren.

Let’s finish out the night with some horrible and painful afflictions of the teeth! Fig 1. Acute Purulent PeridontitisFig 2. Hypertrophic PeridontisFig 3. Apical NecrosisFig 4. Total NecrosisFig 5. Interradicular AbscessFig 6. Interradicular Abscess  Atlas and Textbook of Dentistry including Diseases of the Mouth. Dr. Gustav Preiswerk, 1906. Translated and edited by George W. Warren.

Let’s finish out the night with some horrible and painful afflictions of the teeth!

Fig 1. Acute Purulent Peridontitis
Fig 2. Hypertrophic Peridontis
Fig 3. Apical Necrosis
Fig 4. Total Necrosis
Fig 5. Interradicular Abscess
Fig 6. Interradicular Abscess 

Atlas and Textbook of Dentistry including Diseases of the Mouth. Dr. Gustav Preiswerk, 1906. Translated and edited by George W. Warren.

Amputating the legs. Note the surgeons still wearing their wigs during operations. This isn’t just artistic license, they really did. I mean, I know Dr. Lister hadn’t even been born yet, but really? Wigs?!  A General System of Surgery in Three Parts. Dr. Laurence Heister, 1745.

Amputating the legs. Note the surgeons still wearing their wigs during operations. This isn’t just artistic license, they really did. I mean, I know Dr. Lister hadn’t even been born yet, but really? Wigs?! 

A General System of Surgery in Three Parts. Dr. Laurence Heister, 1745.

Brown’s Household Panacea, the great pain reliever! Evidently so great that this hobo can carry a burning stove without feeling pain…I think I’d be terrified of the stuff at that point.  Late 1800s advert. Brown’s Household Panacea existed long after the Pure Foods Act took the *real* painkillers out of their medication. At some point it became a weird vegetable supplement that also apparently had asprin in it. So it would have done something for pain, just not as much as it used to. Probably not enough to carry a burning stove around, at least D:

Brown’s Household Panacea, the great pain reliever! Evidently so great that this hobo can carry a burning stove without feeling pain…I think I’d be terrified of the stuff at that point. 

Late 1800s advert. Brown’s Household Panacea existed long after the Pure Foods Act took the *real* painkillers out of their medication. At some point it became a weird vegetable supplement that also apparently had asprin in it. So it would have done something for pain, just not as much as it used to. Probably not enough to carry a burning stove around, at least D:

foetusqueen: In April, 29th, 1961 a doctor of the 6th Soviet Antarctic expedition Leonid Rogozov aged 27 felt pain in a right lower belly and fever. The next day brought only exasperation. Having no chance to call a plane and being the only doctor at the station “Novolazarevskaya”, at night, in April, 30th the surgeon made an appendix removal operation on himself using local anesthesia. He was assisted by an engineer and the station’s meteorologist. More recently, the US-based researcher Jerri Nielsen treated her own breast cancer during an antarctic winter. A few days after the winds and storms began to whip up and transport was cut off to the base for the winter, she discovered a lump in her breast. She biopsied herself, realized it was cancer, and administered her own chemotherapy that was delivered by a very dangerous mid-winter drop flight…there was no way they could have picked her up before the spring due to the winds, but they were able to drop the drugs she needed relatively near the base. When she was able to be transported out in the spring, she’d already successfully completed over half of the treatment she needed to have, and was in remission for almost a decade. Sadly, in 2008, the same type of cancer reappeared, but this time it was in her brain. Dr. Nielsen died in 2009. The movie “Ice Bound” was based on her experience.

foetusqueen:

In April, 29th, 1961 a doctor of the 6th Soviet Antarctic expedition Leonid Rogozov aged 27 felt pain in a right lower belly and fever. The next day brought only exasperation. Having no chance to call a plane and being the only doctor at the station “Novolazarevskaya”, at night, in April, 30th the surgeon made an appendix removal operation on himself using local anesthesia. He was assisted by an engineer and the station’s meteorologist.

More recently, the US-based researcher Jerri Nielsen treated her own breast cancer during an antarctic winter. A few days after the winds and storms began to whip up and transport was cut off to the base for the winter, she discovered a lump in her breast. She biopsied herself, realized it was cancer, and administered her own chemotherapy that was delivered by a very dangerous mid-winter drop flight…there was no way they could have picked her up before the spring due to the winds, but they were able to drop the drugs she needed relatively near the base.

When she was able to be transported out in the spring, she’d already successfully completed over half of the treatment she needed to have, and was in remission for almost a decade.

Sadly, in 2008, the same type of cancer reappeared, but this time it was in her brain. Dr. Nielsen died in 2009. The movie “Ice Bound” was based on her experience.