Sure, you might always make sure that you are visiting your regular dentist. However, that alone might not be good enough. You have to make sure that you are taking the time to learn just when you should be referred to a specialist, such as a periodontist. This way, you will be able to help make sure that your dental health is always well taken care of. To help you with this, you need to check out the following signs that it is time to visit the periodontist.

Excessive Gum Retraction

When the gums recede back up and away from the teeth, this is a symptom of gingivitis. When it is happening at an alarming rate or getting a little bit excessive, it goes from something your regular dentist can handle to something a specialist should take a look at. Therefore, should you happen to find that you are dealing with excessive gum retraction, you are going to want to ask your dentist for a referral to a periodontist.

Progressive Bone Loss

While dealing with any amount of bone loss is a problem, dealing with progressive bone loss is a little worse. This is because you are trying to beat the time clock. The last thing you want to do is to take your time getting yourself set up with a specialist. Getting in touch with the best possible periodontist is the best way to make sure that you can stop the bone loss and correct the issue at hand. Sure, you might not be able to reverse any of the damage that has already been done, but you can stop further damage and then work on getting your dental care in order.

Dental Problems With Diabetes

Even if the problems you are experiencing are minor compared to other things you might have dealt with in the past, if you now have diabetes, you need to make sure that you are always seeing a periodontist. This is because diabetes can come with a lot of dental complications, so it is important to seek out the attention of a specialist who has dealt with many similar patients in the past. With the help of a specialist, you will be able to not only take care of any problem that you are currently dealing with, but you might be able to get help in preventing future dental problems.

As you can see, there are some very clear signs that you are going to want to visit a periodontist instead of just the family dentist.