Also called regenerative surgery, a bone graft is used to recreate bone and soft supporting tissues lost due to periodontitis. If you have periodontitis, you may be losing bone support around your teeth. In order to avoid extractions, Dr. Gilbert may recommend regrowing the lost bone with a graft.
The goal of bone grafting is to encourage the body to rebuild the bone and other structures that attach the tooth to the jaw. First, we will separate the gums from your teeth in order to gain access to the roots and bone. The roots will be thoroughly cleaned, and the holes in the bone will be filled with a graft material that usually consists of your own bone, or freeze-dried bone from a bone bank.
After this portion is completed, Dr. Gilbert will put the gums back in place and stitch them together. Over the next few months, the grafted material will be encouraged to grow, and fill in for lost bone and soft tissue.
Ridge Augmentation
A common use of bone grafting is for ridge augmentation. This procedure can recapture the natural contour of your gums and jaw after the loss of a tooth as a result of trauma, congenital anomalies, infection, or periodontal disease. To achieve an ideal amount of gum and bone as a support for surrounding restorations or implants may require both hard- and soft-tissue reconstruction.
After the loss of one or more teeth, your gums and jawbone may become indented where the tooth or teeth once were. This occurs because the jawbone recedes when it no longer has to hold a tooth in place.
Not only is this indentation unnatural looking, it also causes the replacement tooth to look too long compared to the adjacent teeth. This can also create an area that is difficult to keep clean.
Ridge augmentation uses bone and tissue-grafting procedures to fill in the indented area of the jaw and gums, which leaves you with a smooth gum line that coexists with your restoration or dental implant.
