Traditionally, if a patient had periodontal disease, the doctor would have to pull back the gums for visibility and then the diseased tissue is removed. This process involved using a scalpel and cutting, which is quite invasive. Often the doctor would even need to use grafting material and a membrane to ensure the gums reattach properly to the teeth after the procedure.
Luckily, these days, lasers can be used to treat periodontal disease. With laser gum surgery, a laser is used to accurately target and destroy the diseased tissue and the bacteria that infect it, leaving the rest of the gum tissue intact. This makes the procedure significantly less invasive and much easier to recover from.
Here are four key benefits that can come from using lasers as opposed to traditional surgery:
- Less pain – the laser procedure is so painless when compared to traditional gum surgery that often there’s no need to prescribe pain medication after the procedure.
- Less gum recession – while all gum surgeries can result in gum recession, with traditional surgery lowering the gumline by 2-15mm. Laser surgery, on the other hand, results in little to no gum recession.
- Faster healing time – Since the procedure is less invasive and a scalpel and sutures aren’t used, healing is much faster than compared to traditional gum surgery.
- Long-term results – While both traditional and laser dentistry often have good long term results, the laser treatment results in a far more predictable result since the laser stimulates the bone that surrounds the root of the tooth, encouraging the regeneration of tissue around the root.
If you’ve been nervous about getting periodontal surgery, maybe you will find that laser gum surgery alleviates all or most of your concerns, enabling you to get the treatment you need.