ABSTRACT Objective:

To compare and evaluate the clinical efficacy of diode laser and cryosurgery for treating melanin pigmentation of gingiva.

Material and Methods:

A total of twenty-five subjects with physiological gingival pigmentation on the facial aspect of both maxillary and mandibular anterior arches (50 sites), both male and female, with an average age ranging from 18-35 years, participated in the study.

The sites were randomly divided into Group I:

depigmentation by Laser and Group II: depigmentation by Cryosurgery.

The following parameters were assessed for the evaluation of treatment results:

Melanin Oral Pigmentation Index (PI), Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) for pain evaluation and Healing index (HI). The data collected was statistically evaluated.

Results:

On intergroup comparison, there was no statistical difference in the score from baseline (p>0.05); however, a statistically significant difference was seen at the end of 1 year (p<0.05). Moreover, 57-60% of arches showed recurrence of pigmentation in the laser group whereas; only 12.7-17% recurrence was seen in the cryosurgery group at the end of the first year.

Conclusion:

Treatment of gingival hyperpigmentation with laser and cryosurgery shows a marked improvement of gingival pigmentation in both groups, but the cryosurgery depigmentation sites showed more sustainability.