Using Soft Picks to Diagnose Gum Disease

Dr. Jim Hyland, from Toronto, spoke with Dr. John O’Keefe about a change he had introduced in his practice: using soft picks to diagnose gum disease.

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Dr. Jim Hyland recently made a change for the better for his patients. Given not all patients are able to floss between teeth, Dr. Hyland encourages the use large and small Soft Picks as well as Stimudents.

Interestingly, Dr. Hyland found out that he can actually use the Soft Picks to help diagnose the status of a patient’s periodontal health. Pocket depths, recession, scaling and radiographs indicate the presence of periodontal disease but, the use of these adjunct hygiene aids allows patients and clinicians to visualize inflammation and bleeding. Now, he is able to capture a baseline papillary bleeding score to demonstrate the absence or presence of infection and monitor it going forward.