Development of Periodontology and Its Effect on Dental Practice

Abstract

The modem era of investigations in periodontology started in the middle of 60-tieh when it was proved that gingivitis and periodontitis in people and animals are caused by colonies of bacteria that accumulate in the area of teeth and adjacent tissues. Since then a surprising mass of information is gathered owing to which the exceptional progress in the branch of periodontology is made.

Such a development certainly reflected itself also in our stomatology. Periodontology started to develop on the principles of modem conceptions. So, we in Croatia, like other faculties having tradition in development of this, established in the beginning of 70-tieth the Institute for the periodontology and the chair for periodontology, the first independent teaching and health institution of periodontology in Yugoslavia. Since then the development of periodontology at the University of Zagreb could be divided into two phases: In the first acceptance of achievements of modern periodontology in the world in order to educate the stomatologist practitioner in the best possible way and in the second, when the modem approach to the therapy of periodontal diseases had already been attained, our own investigations and cooperation on the international scientific projects have started. The relatively young periodontological institution thus became generally recognized in the country and the world due to the achieved results in the clinical and experimental periodontology. Only few projects will be mentioned here that were carried out in this area: cytologic investigations of the disturbed process of maturation of the surface epithel of gingiva in parodontopathies, citohistochemical investigation of enzymic reactions of cells of healthy and inflamed gingiva, electronomicroscopic investigations of the structure of periodontal tissues and investigations of the factors of defence and local resistance in the area of periodontal pocket by means of altered leucocytes and in connection with it the cytolysis of host leucocytes or the most recent investigation of the influence of Vitamin C on the production of collagen in the tissues of parodont. New investigations in the world and in our country have not resulted only in new fundamental insights into the function of the cell and the tissue in normal and pathologic conditions but also in relevant data for the diagnosis, therapy and prevention of periodontal diseases. The results of these investigations have started to change essentially the way in which these diseases are approached. As the expectation of life is prolonged and the number of population preserving in older age all or few teeth increased, periodontology will take even a bigger part in everyday stomatological praxis.