Supportive Periodontal Therapy

When a patient completes their deep scaling and Root Planing, we do not like to let you go the normal 6 months between cleanings until we have gotten all of your pockets to return to normal with little to no bleeding. Therefore, we like to put you into our supportive periodontal therapy program.

What this means is that we have you return for your next cleaning at 3 months.  We will evaluate your pockets and tissue health, your oral hygiene care and help you to improve in areas where you might still be lacking. We will perform a thorough cleaning and use numbing gels and rinses as needed to go deeper where still necessary. As improvements in plaque control are evident and tissue health is getting better, it is our goal to move you toward a 6 month regular adult cleaning. We never want to give you more time in between your cleanings than is healthy for you. Your efforts with your home care is the biggest factor to determine the length of time between your visits. We can remove all bacteria from your teeth at your cleaning but that bacteria will begin to regrow minutes after you leave the office. It is so important that you make changes to your daily habits to be successful in getting the results we are hoping for. It is truly a team effort.

We might suggest some new aids, brushes or water picks for you to help you to improve.  There are also oral rinses to help slow down bacterial regrowth and maintain good tissue health. There are lots of things we can recommend to help you, but again, it is up to you to be disciplined to do what it takes. It most likely will be a life long battle to keep your gums healthy if you have the genetics which cause you to have gum disease, but you will reap the rewards to do what it takes to have a clean and healthy mouth.