Hi Ron,
A healthy periodontium is described as having “positive architecture” when the interproximal bone is coronal to the buccal and lingual bone. The goal of osseous recontouring is to restore this ideal architecture to a periodontium in which bone loss has caused negative boney architecture. This will result in pocket elimination for long term maintenance. So yes, boney defects can be described as negative arcitecture in a localized respect.

Glenn — Your points are excellent. In fact they are among the main reasons I have gotten involved in laser treatment. In many situations, I felt that the “side effects” ( root exposure, sensitivity, black triangles, removal of healthy supporting bone) were too severe to warrent conventional surgical treatment. I commend you on your quest to learn more about periodontal microsurgery. It will certainly help you and your patients depending on their specific needs.

Talk to you all later.

Andy

HI Bruce….thanks

I use the Argon most times at CW around 1.0 watts.

You can use it higher but then you need to put the laser in pulsed mode 0.2 secs on and off.

For the erbium I use the 600 micron tip most times if it is a big area to lase……maybe gonna start using the chisel tip which has a larger surface area for the bone relief.

I typically will use water on, and use 30Hz and 100 mj or so. You can use more. I wonder whether we should use high settings. As long as the water is on, I dont know if there will be any damage…….

What do you think.

Thanks again Bruce for the kind words.

Its all just me trying things and then posting it for discussion to see how it can be improved. Slowly but surely I am getting a little bit better at using the laser through the magnification, the tips from so many, and trial and error. Its the nature of the beast and I guess why the call it the practice of dentistry, not the perfection of dentistry.

Cya

Glenn