The Role of Periodontal Therapy in Maintaining Dental Hygiene

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Dentistry has different branches such as endodontics, orthodontics, prosthodontics, and Periodontics. Periodontics focuses on prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of tissues surrounding the teeth, mainly gums as well as the periodontal ligament, alveolar bone, and cementum. Tooth replacement is also part of periodontal therapy. However, with good periodontal therapy, you can enjoy lifelong dental health. Regular visits to Trucare for periodontal check ups will preserve teeth as well as tissues, and you should request this therapy. This is because the majority of people assume that focusing on teeth is sufficient. However, gums and other tissues in the mouth play an equally important role in overall oral health.

The components of periodontal therapy

Periodontal therapy is comprehensive and extended compared to simple teeth care or teeth examination. Trucare offers the entire spectrum of sub-set of services covered under this therapy:

  • Routine dental cleaning
  • Gingival pocket measurement, pocket reduction, gum grafts, regeneration
  • X-ray checkup and visual checkup
  • Oral cancer screening
  • Dental crown, implant

Routine dental checkup and cleaning

As part of the overall periodontal therapy at Trucare, routine dental cleaning helps a great deal in maintaining oral hygiene. It starts with a visual exam of the mouth, face, jaw and neck, and then a gingival pocket check to probe depth, recession, and gum attachment. This is important since food can lodge in gingival pockets and promote bacterial growth. This leads to gingivitis or inflammation of the gums and then if left untreated, to periodontal disease. This can damage teeth and even jawbones in the long run. Appropriate, timely steps prevent the onset and progression of the disease.

Your friendly dentist at Trucare also carries out teeth cleaning, a procedure that will remove plaque, another factor responsible for bacterial growth and possible receding of gums. You will also get the benefit of an X-Ray exam to find out possibilities of tooth decay. There is another benefit of visiting Trucare for regular checkups: screening for oral cancer by the presence of lesions or any abnormalities.

As you can see, preventive periodontal care helps identify developing problems and even prevent them from cropping up. You spend a little bit of money and time to ensure excellent oral hygiene. Trucare recommends everyone should go in for a routine checkup as part of periodontal therapy at least once every four or six months. There is a lot more to periodontal therapy, as you will find in the following paragraphs.

Gum grafts, regenerative procedures, laser treatments

Even with the best care, your teeth and gums may require non-surgical or surgical periodontal therapies, including gum grafts, tissue regeneration, and laser treatments.

Gums may recede over time due to vigorous brushing, plaque, or other reasons, laying open parts of the teeth not covered by enamel. This makes the teeth vulnerable to bacterial attack. The simplest solution is to go in for a gum graft. Gum grafts cover up the sensitive part of the teeth, resulting in an even gum line and improve aesthetics.

It may come to the point that you develop a periodontal disease that leads to bone and tissue loss. The periodontal therapy solution at Trucare is to go for regenerative procedures to reverse the damage. The therapy involves folding back the gum, cleaning the area, and using membranes, bone grafts, and tissue-stimulating proteins to accelerate regeneration. This procedure arrests the progression of periodontal disease following which, your friendly Trucare dentist will recommend ways to preserve oral hygiene. Lasers may be used for procedures and to speed up tissue regeneration.

In some cases, there is an excess of gummy tissue leading to a gummy smile. In this case, your Trucare dentist will carry out crown lengthening and gum reduction to improve aesthetics as part of respective periodontal therapy. This is but one of the different periodontal procedures available at Trucare to suit varying conditions.

It may also happen that some patients with medical conditions such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes may have issues such as decayed teeth or periodontitis that require surgical intervention, but which is not possible given their condition. This is where the expertise of Trucare dentists comes into play, striking a fine balance at maintaining the status quo and giving the right periodontal therapy. A decayed tooth will be retained but kept under observation to maintain dentition without further deterioration of the periodontium.

Tooth removal, replacement, and other periodontal therapies

You may need to have your tooth removed because it is beyond redemption. In such cases, your Trucare dentist is likely to carry out tooth extraction and will recommend an implant or, if several teeth are to be removed, then an implant-supported bridge. Implants raise issues such as the availability of good bone structure and density. This can lead to sinus augmentation and ridge modification procedures before the implant is put in place. In most cases, this procedure is successful, and you have an implant that lasts for years. In some cases, there may be cases of peri-implant diseases or conditions such as inflammation that are taken care of in the post-procedure periodontal maintenance therapy.

Therapeutic maintenance

Dental care at TruCare Dentistry does not end with any of the preceding procedures. Maintenance and post-procedural follow-ups are vital. Your family dentist will check to see if healing is right if any complications develop and give holistic guidance for proper care. Factors considered include tooth survival, need for treatment again, and how existing conditions impact overall system health and quality of life.

Why is therapeutic maintenance important? The answer is that studies show that after procedures such as gum restoration or grafts, it is possible that residual pockets can form, and there may be bleeding. Pockets with a depth greater than 6 mm are a matter of concern and, if ignored, can lead to eventual tooth loss.

It must also be kept in mind that periodic periodontal maintenance is also essential for overall health. Ignoring a progressive condition such as tooth decay can cause bacteria to spread to other parts of the body and affect the heart and organs.

Gums and the overall health of the oral cavity are important to preserve teeth. Trucare recommends that you make it a point to undergo regular checkups as the starting point to prevent problems from reaching a stage where they become painful and expensive to treat.