[Pyogenic infections of the jaws and adjacent soft parts - retrospective analysis of 9,069 patients treated on an outpatient basis between 1969 and 1978 at the Clinic of Stomatology, University of Halle/Saale (author's transl)].

Of 162.338 patients who between 1969 and 1978 received treatment at the Clinic of Stomatology, University of Halle-an-der-Saale, 9.069 (or 5.6 percent) were treated on an outpatient basis after having been diagnosed as having actinomycosis, osteomyelitis, lymphadenitis, difficult dentition, and nonspecific pyogenic soft-part infections (abscesses or infiltrates). A retrospective analysis by electronic data processing of case histories provided valuable information about morbidity, disposition, cause, localization, and the tendency for dental surgeons to refer certain cases to specialty clinics. There are pathognomonic differences in indexical systems for the different clinical pictures. Cases of osteomyelitis and soft-part infection with suspected actinomycosis were found to increase in correlation with the proportion of antimicrobially pretreated patients. About 60 percent of all patients receiving treatment at this Clinic were not referred thereto by dentists. Of the documents presented by patients referred to the Clinic of Stomatology by other dental surgeons, some 42.5 percent were filled out incompletely.