Classification of periodontal diseases: history, present and future

Classification of periodontitis patients has been a challenge troughout the last 100 years. Historically, the classification of peridontal disease has been directly linked to the available knowledge about the clinical symptoms and the pathogenesis of the disease. Thus, throughout the years and paralel tot he development of knowledge, disease classification has evolved and has been updated several times. Currently, the internationally accepted classification system is the one proposed by Armitage (1999). However, also other disease clasification systems have been proposed aiming for an easier clinical applicability (Van der Velden 2000). Despit the efforts, classification remains an issue of controversy and all the different proposed systems present advantages and shortcomings. New knowledge of the disease etiology and pathobiology, as well as contemporary bioinformatics techniques, could contribute to the improvement of the current classification systems.