Clinical Treatment Endpoints After Active Periodontal Treatment and 10 Years of Supportive Periodontal Care: A...

Comparing periodontal stability following active periodontal treatment (APT/T1) and 120 ± 12 months of supportive periodontal care (SPC/T2) using four clinical endpoints (CEPs).

CEP1: pocket probing depths (PPD) ≤ 4 mm, no sites with ≥ 4 mm with bleeding on probing (BOP), and total BOP < 10%; CEP2: no PPD > 4 mm with BOP or PPD ≥ 6 mm; CEP3: ≤ 4 sites with PPD ≥ 5 mm; CEP4: ≤ 5 teeth with PPD ≥ 5 mm. Assuming CEPs are mutually exclusive, patient- and tooth-related parameters (e.g., periodontal tooth loss: PTL) were compared. Using receiver operating characteristic analysis for the prediction of PTL as a cutoff for CEP was assessed.

From 128 patients (age 65.5 ± 10.5 years; 83 stage III, 45 stage IV; 47 grade B, 81 grade C), 7 achieved CEP1, 23 CEP2, 45 CEP3, 23 CEP4, 30 noCEP at T1. At T2, six patients reached CEP1, 37 CEP2, 38 CEP3, 35 CEP4, 12 noCEP. For noCEP, the number of sites with PPD > 5 mm increased significantly, and PTL was higher compared to CEP1, CEP2 and CEP3 (p < 0.001).

While achieving CEP1 is possible through comprehensive APT, treating a chronic disease often leads to less ideal CEP2/CEP3. Achieving CEP1, CEP2 or CEP3 after APT made no observable difference regarding PTL.

The study is registered with the United States National Library of Medicine in the clinical trials database (URL: https://clinicaltrials.gov; NCT03048045).