Periodontal

We Make Soft Tissues Healthy, Beautiful, And Functional

Your gums are a crucial protective seal for your teeth. If your gums become diseased, they can eventually recede, causing you to lose teeth and even bone. Gum disease has also been linked to heart disease, stroke, cancer, and other serious health conditions. Avoid gum disease by brushing and flossing your teeth as directed, undergoing routine teeth cleanings, and avoiding tobacco use. If gum disease isn’t your issue, but the aesthetics or function of your soft tissues, there’s treatment available for those, too. Led by longtime colleagues Dr. Hoang Doan and Dr. Johnny Trinh, Sapphire Family Dentistry excels in rehabilitating soft tissues through periodontics in Richmond, TX.

Signs You Need Periodontics

• Gum soreness, bleeding, and inflammation
• Pockets between your teeth and gums
• Gum recession
• Persistent bad breath
• Loose teeth
• Increased tooth sensitivity
• Difficulty eating or speaking
• Excessive gum tissue

1. Scaling And Root Planing

Hardened dental plaque, also called tartar, can accumulate on your teeth beneath the gums. If you don’t have this condition treated, the tartar may cause your teeth to separate from your gums, resulting in deep periodontal pockets. Scaling and root planing is a typical treatment for this. With scaling, our team scrapes away the plaque buildup. We follow this with root planing, during which we smooth down the tooth enamel at the root to eliminate any tiny cracks or grooves where bacteria can hide and flourish. After this, your gums will be able to reattach to your teeth.

2. Periodontal Maintenance

When it reaches its most advanced stage, gum disease becomes incurable but can still be treated. After you complete your initial gum disease treatment with our team, we may schedule you to come back to our office periodically for periodontal maintenance. This is done to keep your gum disease from returning or from becoming more advanced. During these return visits, we typically perform more scaling and root planning to eliminate any bacteria that may have built up since your last visit.

3. Gingivectomy

When your gums detach from your teeth, this may indicate an infection of bacteria-releasing tartar on your teeth underneath your gums. If scaling and root planing prove to be inadequate for your level of infection, we can perform a gingivectomy, which means removing the diseased gum tissue. After this procedure, your gums should naturally reattach to your teeth.

4. Frenectomy

It’s likely you’ve never heard of frenula, but most people have two of them and rely on them for normal daily functions such as eating and speaking. Your frenula are the thin tissues that connect your tongue to the bottom of your mouth and your upper lip to your upper gums. If these tissues are too short or tight, they can make it difficult for you to eat or speak naturally. We can fix these issues by removing the problematic tissues, a procedure called a frenectomy.

5. Crown Lengthening

Do you feel you have too much gum tissue and too little tooth enamel showing when you smile? That’s a condition known as a “gummy smile.” It usually won’t affect your health, but it can hurt your confidence if you feel self-conscious about the way you look. Through crown lengthening, our team can create a better balance between your gums and teeth. This treatment doesn’t actually make your teeth longer, they just look that way afterward. We simply remove some gum tissue from in front of certain teeth so that your gums no longer dominate your smile.