Gingival Grafts
Gingival or Gum grafts may be required if the gum has receded due to toothbrush trauma or loss of tissue for other reasons. The aim of this treatment is to replace or provide a new section of gum that has the correct structure. Around teeth you have two types of gum tissue: 1. The hard or keratinized gum; and 2. the normal skin or mucosa found in the rest of your mouth. This second type of tissue does not normally sit against the tooth and has completely different characteristics to the hard gum. The aim of the treatment is to replace or improve the amount of hard gum around the tooth.
There have been many different types of grafts proposed over the years but only two of them give good reproducible results. These are the connective tissue graft and the collagen graft.
The connective tissue graft has superior results compared with the collagen graft but it has a significant draw back as it usually requires a donor site elsewhere in the mouth (the palate or the retromolar (behind the last molar) areas). Many patients will elect to use the collagen graft for these reasons.
The graft material is placed into a pocket created within the existing gum to recreate the hard gum material.
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