How Long Does Gingivitis Take To Progress To Periodontitis?
Posted on 12/1/2023 by Weo Admin |
 Gum disease creeps in silently, often causing no pain till it reaches severe levels. Even when people notice early gum disease symptoms, they take it lightly, not seeking dentists' attention. Understanding gum disease and its stages helps you to guard your oral health.
What is Gingivitis?
The earliest phase of gum disease is referred to as gingivitis. It is the mildest, meaning it is easy for patients to miss catching the disease at home. The easiest symptom you see to show that you have gingivitis is bleeding when flossing. The gums may darken and become puffy or swollen.
As it worsens, gingivitis can bring bad breath, tender gums, and receding gum tissue. Although you may not show all these symptoms, particularly if the gingivitis is mild, a surefire sign would be the bleeding of gums.
How Fast or Slow Does Gingivitis Progress?
Left untreated, gingivitis will almost always progress further, becoming difficult to contain. Luckily, gingivitis can easily be treated and cured, but once it turns into periodontitis, an advanced periodontal disease, it is irreversible. You can't cure it at this point, and dentists only work to manage its symptoms.
A study published at the National Library of Medicine hints that patients beginning from level 1 type of gingivitis would take approximately 66.8 weeks, which translates to slightly over 15 months, to progress to periodontitis. Therefore, if your gingivitis is already more advanced, it would take a little less time to get to the periodontitis state.
With a timeline of about 15 months, it indicates that gingivitis progresses quite slowly. Hence, if you regularly reach out to a dentist, you could have it treated and stopped.
To have your gum disease treated, visit our periodontist. We will do thorough mouth inspections focusing on the gums to see how healthy or diseased they are. From there, we will provide a personalized treatment plan to eradicate your gum disease if it has not advanced.
If it has reached periodontitis stages, then we treat you and place you in a periodontal disease maintenance program. This special mouth-cleaning program helps prevent the comeback of the disease.
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