Prof Howard Gluckman

16/10/2026

The most useful older case may be the one that changes how you practice now.

At the EAO Congress in Monaco last year, I spoke about how surgical techniques in implant dentistry have evolved over time.

Dentistry continues to move faster, planning is increasingly digital, surgery can be guided, and our understanding of biology continues to improve.

There's, however, one part of dentistry we cannot accelerate: time.

Time shows us what remained stable, what changed, and whether the decision we made years earlier still makes sense when we see the biological result.

Some of my implant cases at 19 and 25 years no longer look as ideal as they once did. A tooth treated conservatively remains functional after 28 years.

This doesn't make preservation the answer in every case. It does, however, remind us why long-term follow-up matters.

15/10/2026

13/10/2026

Why would we still want to see you when everything feels fine?

Feeling fine and being stable aren't always the same thing.

Changes around teeth or dental implants can begin before they become noticeable.

Review appointments allow us to compare what we see now with previous findings, assess how the tissues are behaving, and decide whether anything in the maintenance plan needs to change.

The timing of those reviews depends on the treatment, the patient, and the risks being monitored.

Maintenance is part of long-term care from the beginning, not something we introduce when there's a problem.

Learn more about our approach on the website - link in first comment below 👇

09/10/2026

The implant is only one part of the result.

The soft tissue around it has an important functional role.

Healthy, well-supported gum tissue helps protect the underlying bone, while the condition of the bone also influences the soft tissue above it. They need to be considered together.

That's why implant planning doesn't stop at where the implant will be positioned.

We also look at the quality of the surrounding bone and soft tissue, what may change over time, and what should be preserved where possible.

08/10/2026

Achievable is not the same as reproducible.

Our 2018 socket-shield series reported 96.1% implant survival.

It also reported 25 complications across 128 cases.

The technique could work, but the complication rate showed us where it still needed to improve.

What followed was refinement: questioning the preparation, the parameters, and the areas where the protocol was vulnerable.

Achievability shows possibility. Reproducibility is built by learning from what did not behave as intended.

08/10/2026

06/10/2026

A final photograph is not the final outcome.

Completing treatment is an important milestone, but evaluation should continue beyond that day.

Over time, we look at how the surrounding tissues are behaving, whether function remains comfortable, and whether anything has changed that needs attention or maintenance.

A photograph records a moment. Follow-up helps us understand what remained stable, what changed, and whether the original plan is continuing to serve the patient as intended.

A complete treatment plan should include what happens after treatment too.

Learn more about our approach on the website. Link in the first comment below.

30/09/2026

A successful case is useful; however, a full case series is more useful.

In surgery, predictability cannot be judged from the best result in expert hands.

It has to be judged across different patients, different anatomies, complications, revisions, and time.
That's why complication data matters.

In a 128-case socket-shield evaluation I participated in, the survival rate was 96.1%. The combined complication rate was 19.5%.

Both numbers matter because complications show where a technique is sensitive, where planning matters, and where protocols need refinement.

Clinical growth begins when we are willing to examine our own outcomes honestly.

Not only the cases that worked, but also the ones that taught us why the technique needed to improve as well.

29/09/2026

Three cases are not a conclusion.

They are a clinical question.

This paper explores whether a curved anterior defect can be reconstructed more precisely by adapting the graft to the anatomy.

The result and the limits matter equally.

Read the full publication on our website.

Link in first comment below 👇