ELECTROGALVANIC LESIONS OF THE ORAL CAVITY PRODUCED BY METALLIC DENTURES

Abstract

In a previous communication I¹discussed lesions of the oral cavity caused by electrogalvanic discharges between dissimilar metallic dentures and reported thirty consecutive cases measured for electric current. Since that time I have been privileged to make a careful study of more than 300 additional cases which contained various dissimilar metallic dentures. From this study, I feel justified in forming certain definite conclusions. I have confirmed, by repeated experiments, that human saliva, whether acid, alkaline or neutral, makes a good electrolyte through which metallic electrons freely circulate from a higher to a lower electropotentiality. Thus, within every oral cavity which contains dentures such as plates, bridges, crowns, or fillings of dissimilar elemental consistency, there is constituted a complete galvanic battery. This newly discovered oral cavity phenomenon is in keeping with a fundamental law of electrophysics discovered by Galvani in 1786—later verified by Volta— which declares that when dissimilar metals