Gum Contouring
To make sure that not only your teeth but also your gums enhance your smile, you may benefit from some gum contouring.
This contouring may range from simply removing some of the gum tissue to improve a ‘gummy’ smile to the more complex removal of both bone and gum tissue.
Gummy smiles are a common problem, caused by overgrowth of the gum tissue that then covers the teeth. This makes gums appear too visible, or simply too big, when smiling. This can cause a smile to look crooked or lop-sided, or make the teeth seem smaller than the gums.
Gummy smiles can be corrected easily with a simple procedure known as cosmetic gum lifting or gum contouring.
A local anaesthetic is applied to the gums and a laser is used to trim away the small amounts of excess gum tissue and reshape the edges of the gums above the six front teeth that form the smile. The laser seals the blood vessels in the gums so that the tissue can heal quickly with relatively little discomfort to the patient.