Healthy gums are not too red. They don’t bleed when you brush them. Yet another sign of gum health is how they fit around your teeth. If this tissue securely supports your teeth, your gums are probably free of disease or other trauma caused by the likes of aggressive brushing and flossing.
If, however, your teeth appear to have grown longer over time they may be pulling away from the bone. Your teeth may become more sensitive, but that’s just the start. Since you now have a space between your gums and your teeth, damaging bacteria can build up in these pockets. If the condition goes untreated, gum disease can progress and cause teeth to become loose, fall out, or they may become so decayed that an extraction is required.
A better treatment
Extractions should always be a last resort. Dr. Jamil Alkhoury will not only prevent such damage, but he can help you regain the tissue that was lost. Unlike invasive surgical procedures, which transplant tissue from another part of the mouth to the gums to build up a recessed gum line, regenerative techniques actually encourage the body to create more tissue on its own.
Brentwood Family Dental’s approach to re-stimulating the production of lost tissue is known as the Pinhole Surgical Technique™. Dr. Alkhoury creates tiny pinholes in the tissue, which allows him to shift the recessed tissue over the exposed tooth roots. These roots are exposed as the gums pull away, causing the sensitivity to hot or cold food and drink as they don’t have a protective enamel covering like the crown or top of the tooth above the gum line.
This procedure is done without the use of a scalpel. No stitches are needed and there is no need to remove tissue from one area and place it in another area, affecting more than one part of the mouth. Since the procedure is no noninvasive, the long healing times, discomfort, bleeding and other complications of treatments such as grafting are eliminated. Since blood supply and availability of the protein collagen is so robust in this area, it’s hard to even tell a small hole was made in the tissue the following day.
With a procedure so focused on minimizing discomfort, there is no reason to avoid treatment any longer. Treatment means you also avoid complications arising form this progressive condition. Call 925-344-5296 to schedule an examination at Brentwood Family Dental and start the process of getting your mouth healthy again.
