Gingival recession treatment: Guided tissue regeneration with bioabsorbable membrane versus connective tissue graft

Background: Gingival recession represents a significant concern for patient s and a therapeutic problem for clinicians. Several techniques have been pr oposed to achieve root coverage. The purpose of this randomized clinical tr ial was to evaluate the effect of a guided tissue regeneration (GTR) proced ure in comparison to connective tissue graft (CTG) in the treatment of ging ival recession defects. Methods: Twelve patients, each contributing a pair of Miller Class I or II buccal gingival recessions, were treated. In each patient one randomly chos en defect received a poly(lactic acid)based bioabsorbable membrane, while t he paired defect received a CTG. Clinical recordings included oral hygiene standards and gingival health, recession depth (RD), recession width (RW), probing depth (PD), clinical attachment level (CAL), and keratinized tissue width (KT). Results: Mean RD statistically significantly decreased from 2.5 mm presurge ry to 0.5 mm with GTR (81% root coverage), and from 2.5 mm to 0.1 mm with C TG (96% root coverage), at 6 months postsurgery. Prevalence of complete roo t coverage was 58% for the GTR group and 83% for the CTG group. Mean CAL ga in was 2.0 mm for the GTR group and 2.2 mm for the CTG group. No statistica lly significant differences between treatment groups were observed for chan ges in RD, RW, PD, GAL, and KT. Conclusions: Treatment of human gingival recession defects by means of eith er GTR or CTG results in clinically and statistically significant improveme nt of the soft tissue conditions of the defect when pre- and post-treatment measurements were compared. Although differences between CTG and GTR in me an root coverage and prevalence of complete coverage consistently favored t he CTG procedure, the differences in measurements were not statistically si gnificant.