Osseous Surgery – Pocket Depth Reduction
The main cause of periodontal disease is bacteria in the form of a sticky, colorless plaque that constantly forms on your teeth. Many factors can cause periodontal disease or influence its progression.
Your bone and gum tissue should fit snugly around your teeth like a turtleneck around your neck. When you have periodontal disease, this supporting tissue and bone is destroyed, forming "pockets" around the teeth.
Over time, these pockets become deeper, providing a larger space for bacteria to live. As bacteria develop around the teeth, they can accumulate and advance under the gum tissue. These deep pockets collect even more bacteria, resulting in further bone and tissue loss. Eventually, too much bone is lost, and the teeth need to be extracted.
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A pocket reduction procedure may be recommended because you have pockets that are too deep to clean with daily at-home oral hygiene and a professional care routine. Reduced pockets and a combination of daily oral hygiene and professional maintenance care increase your chances of keeping your natural teeth - and decreases your chances of serious health problems associated with periodontal disease.
Procedure
During this procedure, we will fold back the gum tissue and remove the disease-causing bacteria before securing the tissue into place. In some cases, irregular surfaces of the damaged bone are smoothed to limit areas where disease-causing bacteria can hide. This allows the gum tissue to better reattach to healthy bone.
