Oral surgery has progressed significantly in the past decade and some high demand procedures did not exist before the turn of the century. Massachusetts oral surgeons are well versed in the dental needs of the modern populace and provide care to children and adults.

Common surgeries for wisdom teeth removal, tooth extraction and TMJ disorder may be familiar to many patients, but there is a newer process for dental implants. Dental implants have done away with bridges and dentures in most cases, and do not have to be removed for cleaning. An implanted tooth is treated like a tooth that grew there. Facial trauma is addressed with oral surgery, of course, and injuries and defects of the mouth and jaw are corrected with maxillofacial surgery.

Frenectomy, which deals with muscles in the mouth, and apicoectomy, an infection removal near the nerve of the tooth, are not generally well-known, but are necessary at times, and a dentist will refer patients to an oral surgeon for such procedures. Other disease related issues that must be referred to an oral surgeon are bone grafts and corrective jaw surgery. Bone grafts are done when the jaw bone shrinks or deteriorates. Bone from somewhere on the patient's body or from a bone bank can be grafted onto the jaw bone to fill in a gap. This allows for a dental implant as well, if the lack of bone is related to a missing tooth.

A corrective jaw procedure is done when there is jaw misalignment. This can often be repaired with braces for the teeth, but there is an alternative if not. Oral pathology, which usually means cancer of some part of the mouth, throat or face, is treated surgically in the office.

Several options for sedation are available and the patient and doctor can decide which is appropriate for what needs to be done. Intravenous general anesthetic for putting the patient to sleep can even be given in the office. Nitrous oxide with a local anesthetic, or just the local, is another possibility. The medical staff will explain what is to be done and how the patient will be sedated. If a biopsy is taken, an oral pathologist will analyze it and send results to the referring dentist, who can discuss it with the patient to set a course of treatment if so indicated.

The physician will review recommended treatment and the plan for the indicated surgery to restore the health of the patient as soon as possible.