The Ypsilanti daily press. (Ypsilanti, Mich.) 1928-1962, 1944-09-20
BY Logan clendennins, M. D.


both eye and ear specialists have
to know great deal about the
brain, and besides the functions
with which they deal, seeing and
hearing are most intimately asso-
ciated with human personality
and happiness. But the wisdom
teeth in spite of the name given
them have nothing to do with wis
dom or personality or brain func-
ton. They rate a specially simply
and alone on account of their all.
fired inherent cussedness.
Wisdom teeth are really YES
tigial structures, but they don't
know it. We don't need them, but
they insist on climbing aboard and
only too often, like extra passen-
gers generally, they make trouble.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, / think it
was, said that we are each like an
omnibus in which all of our an
cestors are riding and every once
in a while one of them sticks his
head out of a window and embar-
rasses US. So with these vestigial
structures-the appendix and pos
sibly the tonsils are other. exam
pies, Of value only to undertakers
and surgeons. They are as out of
date as dodo birds and fascists.
A hundred thousand years from
now wisdom teeth may be really
vestigial, like human tails. AS a
matter of common sense am sorry
that evolution took the turn it did
and made tails completely vesti-
gial structures. | was wrapping
and tying a package the other day
and tail would have been very
useful-to hold down the knots.
Semi-vestigial Third Molars
The third molars, upper and
lower, are semi-vestigial because
the jaw Of modern man is not big
enough for them. Our ancestors,
the cave man or pithecanthopus,
made good use of them. He had a
large prognathic jaw and he prob
ably cracked open bones with his
teeth to get the marrow - so he
needed big heavy ones. But in this
day and age of the receding chin
they are pure trouble.
They insist on coming in to the
picture after all the other teeth
are in place and a fellow is all
comfortably set for life. At the
age of wisdom, as some cynic sup
posed when he nicknamed them.
They don't even begin to calcify
in the jaw until the age of eight to
ten years, while the first perma-
nent molars are calcified at birth.
And they don't try to push up into
place until somewhere between the
seventeenth and thirtieth year.
Often Impacted
Besides this they often get laid
down sideways and when they
start to grow they push against
the roots of the other teeth and
get impacted. They may grow out
in any direction. One specimen
shown in the rooms Of the London
dental society blithely came out
on the outside just beneath the
angle Of the jaw.
In performing these gyrations
they make all sorts of trouble.
People at the age Of wisdom" who
have neuralgia in either upper or
lower jaws should think of an I'M
erupted third molar as the cause.
They may do even worse things.
Epson records patients who had
insomnia, melancholy and serious
nervous disorders. Lyons reported
four patients with epilepsy whose
seizures entirely cleared up after
removal Of impacted, interrupted
third molars.
The X-ray has really put the
science Of third molar surgery on
the map, because with it the exact
position and condition of the
teeth can be seen. To treat the
complicated cases really requires
the services of an expert.
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
d. Z. Ais it possible for a
teen age child to get rid Of
asthma?
Answer: Yes, when it begins
young the child often outgrows
asthma, just as children outgrow
infantile eczema, both diseases
being caused in the same manner.
TO PRESS CASES