2007 Volume 50 Issue 4 Pages 425-431
The purpose of this study was to compare post-operative healing between sulcular triangular flap and Luebke-Ochsenbein(L-O)flap for apicoectomy with respect to marginal gingiva recession and scar tissue formation. The surgical areas of 51 teeth were recorded using an intra-oral camera to observe soft tissue healing at 1-, 3- and 6- month recalls. The marginal gingiva recession and scar tissue formation of the surgical areas were evaluated on postoperative photographs compared with pre-operative ones. The sulcular triangular flap design showed significantly more marginal gingiva recession than the L-O flap design(p<0.05). While the L-O flap design showed more scar tissue formation than the sulcular triangular flap design in horizontal incision(p<0.05), there was no significant difference between them in vertical incision. Scar tissue formation by the L-O flap and marginal gingiva recession by the sulcular triangular flap could occur after apicoectomy.
