New surgery approaches preserving entire papilla to treat isolated interdental intrabony defects: A narrative review

OBJECTIVES: To review novel techniques of preserving the entire papilla to minimize the trauma of fragile papilla in periodontal regeneration surgeries. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Electronic databases (Pubmed) and relevant journals were searched until September 4, 2020. Randomized controlled trials, cross‐sectional and cohort studies in English were included. Three novel approaches of preserving the entire papilla were applied to bone regeneration for intrabony defects, which were entire papilla preservations (EPP), nonincised papillae surgical approach (NIPSA) and modified vestibular incision subperiosteal tunnel access (M‐VISTA). RESULTS: Randomized control trials of the novel preserving entire papilla techniques were rarely reported. There were only case series or cohort studies. Several papilla preservation techniques (PPT) or minimally invasiveness surgical techniques (MIST) have existed for a long time. However, these techniques still have dissection at the papilla. There were no related RCTs comparing the three novel approaches of keeping the entire papilla with PPT and MIST. All three techniques showed totally primary wound closure. Compared with PPT/MIST, EPP and NIPSA seemed to have better clinical outcomes in reducing probing depth (PD) and clinical attachment level (CAL) gain. CONCLUSIONS: EPP and NIPSA seemed to have advanced results of PD reduction and CAL gain than PPT and MIST. This is needed to be confirmed by further research.