Periodontitis is an extremely serious dental condition, and the damage it can cause isn't limited to your teeth and gums. This severe form of gum disease can also attack the bones in your jaw, leaving them weak and atrophied. This can cause serious, long-term oral health problems.
Fortunately, this damage need not be permanent. Oral surgeons perform thousands of jawbone grafts every year, and these tried-and-tested surgical procedures are highly effective at reversing jawbone damage caused by periodontitis.
How Does Periodontitis Affect Your Jawbone?
The mildest form of gum disease is known as gingivitis, and is caused by harmful bacteria attacking your gum tissues. It can cause painful inflammation and bleeding, but can usually be treated effectively by your dentist. However, if gingivitis goes untreated for too long, it may progress to periodontitis.
When gingivitis turns into periodontitis, the harmful bacteria spread to the tissues beneath the gums. This includes the upper jawbone (maxilla) and lower jawbone (mandible).
Like all the bones in your body, your jawbone is constantly being broken down and rebuilt by specialized bone cells, known as osteoclasts. The bacteria that cause periodontitis can attack these cells, preventing them from rebuilding the jawbone. Over time, the jawbone can shrink, becoming weak and brittle, as it is unable to rebuild itself and repair damage. This is known as bone resorption.
How Can Jawbone Damage Affect My Health?
If your jawbone has been damaged by periodontitis, it may no longer be strong enough to support and stabilize your teeth. They may become loose, or fall out entirely. Many people who suffer from periodontitis lose several teeth in a short period.
To make matters worse, tooth loss can also weaken your jawbone. When a tooth is lost, the body will stop rebuilding the bone beneath the lost tooth, causing it to atrophy over time even after the infection is treated.
Jawbone damage can also make it more difficult to replace any teeth you have lost. Dentures and dental implants rely on a strong jawbone to provide support, and may not be useable if your jawbone is severely atrophied.
Significant jawbone damage can even affect your appearance. As the jawbone shrinks, the shape of the lower half of your face may change. Your cheeks may start to appear sunken and hollow, and the skin in and around your lips can become loose and wrinkled.
How Can Jawbone Grafts Repair Damage Caused By Periodontitis?
Jawbone grafts use a simple but highly effective approach to repair jawbone damage caused by periodontitis. A section of bone taken from a donor is attached to the damaged section of jawbone, restoring it to its original shape and giving it additional strength and support.
Donor bones can be taken from a number of sources. You can even donate bone to yourself—this is called an allograft, and uses bone removed from another part of your body. The bone may be taken from a different, stronger part of your jaw, or another part of your body entirely (such as the hip).
Alternatively, bone can be taken from a compatible human donor, or specially treated animal bone can be used for the graft. Some oral surgeons also use cutting-edge, synthetic bone substitutes. Each of these approaches has advantages and disadvantages, and your surgeon will give you in-depth advice and recommendations depending on your needs.
Once a successful graft oral surgery has been performed, your body will start connecting the new bone to your original jawbone, creating new bone tissue and blood vessels to link the two sections of bone together. Your repaired jawbone will be much stronger, and should be able to support implants or dentures to replace any teeth you have lost.