Surgical Procedures

When is Peri­odon­tal Surgery Necessary?

Peri­odon­tal surgery often is nec­es­sary in mod­er­ate to advanced cases of peri­odon­tal dis­ease when the gums around your teeth form deep peri­odon­tal pock­ets that can­not be ade­quately cleaned or treated with non-surgical treatment.

If left untreated, plaque and tar­tar in deep peri­odon­tal pocket will remain on the tooth roots, and will even­tu­ally cause more gum and bone loss around the teeth, often with­out pain as a warn­ing sign for many years. It is for this rea­son that peri­odon­tal dis­ease can be called a silent killer of teeth.

Peri­odon­tal Surgery can be indi­cated when one or more of the fol­low­ing con­di­tions are present:

1. When peri­odon­tal dis­ease is detected at its mod­er­ate to advanced stage
2. When peri­odon­tal pocket depths are deep
3. When addi­tion of bone grafts is desired or required
4. When re-shaping of under­ly­ing affected bone is desired or required
5. When regen­er­a­tion of tis­sues is desired
6. When excess gum tis­sue is to be removed or re-shaped
7. When addi­tional tooth expo­sure is required for restora­tive or cos­metic reasons
8. When soft tis­sue graft­ing to cover roots or thicken gum tis­sue is desired or required
9. When cor­rec­tion of con­tours of fill­ings below the gums are required or desired.

Other indi­ca­tions for peri­odon­tal surgery exist as well.

What is Peri­odon­tal Surgery?

Peri­odon­tal surgery can involve the lift­ing up of gum tis­sue to gain access and vis­i­bil­ity to remove plaque, cal­cu­lus and its asso­ci­ated bac­te­ria from the roots of teeth in spaces too far under the gums to treat with non-surgical treat­ment. Also the lift­ing up of the gum tis­sue allows access to the bone for bone graft­ing or the place­ment of mate­ri­als to aid in the regen­er­a­tion of bone and gum tis­sue through guided tis­sue regen­er­a­tion and bone graft­ing procedures.

Click on the var­i­ous sur­gi­cal pro­ce­dures offered at our peri­odon­tal office to learn more.