Introduction

• Alveolectomy (alveolar ostectomy) refers to removal of some or all alveolar bone surrounding a tooth.
• Alveoloplasty (alveolar osteoplasty) is a form of aveolectomy performed to restore physiological contours of alveolar bone.

Uses

• To facilitate access to and elevation of a tooth or crown-root segment during open tooth extraction or hemisection procedures.
• To reduce the height of alveolar sockets during crown lengthening procedures.
• To eliminate infrabony pockets in teeth with vertical alveolar bone loss.
• To correct alveolar margin contours (eg smooth sharp, irregular bony margins) and harmonize alveolar processs architecture (eg remove bulbous and protuberant bone).

Requirements

Preparation

Procedure

Aftercare

Further Reading

Publications

Refereed papers

• Recent references from PubMed and VetMedResource.

Other sources of information

• Wolf H F, Rateischak E M, Reteischak K H, Hassell T M (2005)Color Atlas of Dental Medicine - Periodontology.3rd edn. Thieme, Stuttgart.