The goal of periodontal regenerative therapy is to replace bone, cementum, and periodontal ligament on a previously diseased root surface, which has suffered the loss of these supporting structures. To accomplish the regeneration, a number of surgical procedures have been advocated throughout the years. There seems to be a potential for some spontaneous periodontal tissue regeneration in the bottom of periodontal defect following open flap debridement alone. The aim of this study was to analyse the radiographic bone changes over 2-year after flap operation.

Patients attending the department of periodontics of Kyungpook National University Hospital were studied. Patients had clinical and radiographic evidence of infrabony defect(s). forty two sites of 33 patients aged 26 to 65 (mean age 45.5) were treated by flap operation with or without osseous surgery. Baseline and over 2-year follow-up radiographs were collected and evaluated for this study. Radiographic assessment includes a bone fill, bone crest change, defect resolution, and % of defect resolution. Pre- and post-treatment differences between variables (maxilla and mandible, gender, defect depth, defect angle) using the paired t-test were examined.

We observed 0.74 mm of bone fill, 0.66 mm of crestal resorption, 1.40 mm of defect resolution, and 27% of percentage of defect resolution. Mandible, women, deeper initial defect depth, narrower initial defect angle showed greater bone fill, defect resolution, and % of defect resolution.

The results of this study suggest that the use of flap operation did enhance the outcome in terms of radiographically detectable bone fill. Both treatment resulted in some loss of crestal bone height.