Keith L. Kirkwood, DDS, PhD

Periodontist - DDS/PhD, Endowed Chair, Senior Dean

Specialties & Experience of this Expert Witness

Additional Information

Dr. Keith L. Kirkwood is a board-certified periodontist (Diplomate, American Board of Periodontology) and the Centennial Endowed Professor and Senior Associate Dean for Research at the University at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine. He holds a DDS from West Virginia University, a PhD in Oral Biology from the State University of New York at Buffalo, and a postgraduate certificate in Periodontology from SUNY Buffalo. He has been licensed to practice dentistry and periodontics in New York since 1991. Dr. Kirkwood has more than 25 years of clinical experience in periodontics, including private practice limited to periodontics in New York, Michigan, and South Carolina, and attending periodontist appointments at the Western New York VA Medical Center. He continues to serve as Consulting Scientist in the Department of Head & Neck and Plastic & Reconstructive Surgery at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center. His clinical expertise spans surgical and non-surgical periodontal therapy, dental implants, peri-implantitis (he served as Principal Investigator on multi-center clinical trials of treatments for peri-implantitis sponsored by OraPharma and Dexcel Pharma), bone grafting and periodontal regeneration, soft and hard tissue grafting, esthetic periodontal surgery, crown lengthening, and the management of periodontal disease in medically complex patients — including those with diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and patients on bisphosphonates and other antiresorptive medications. Dr. Kirkwood has been continuously NIH-funded since 1996 as Principal Investigator on multiple R01, K-series, and program project awards totaling over $40 million in direct support. He has authored more than 125 peer-reviewed publications in journals including the Journal of Dental Research, Journal of Periodontology, Cancer Research, and Cell Reports, along with book chapters in Carranza's Clinical Periodontology — the field's definitive textbook — across editions 10 through 14. He served on the 2017 World Workshop on the Classification of Periodontal and Peri-Implant Diseases and Conditions, the international consensus group whose classifications now define the diagnostic standards used in periodontal and peri-implant practice worldwide. Dr. Kirkwood is a Fellow of the American Association for Dental Research (AADR) and a recipient of the IADR Distinguished Scientist Award for Pharmacology, Therapeutics, and Toxicology Research. He is a past President of the IADR/AADR Pharmacology, Toxicology, and Therapeutics Group, has served as a standing member of the NIH Oral, Dental and Craniofacial Sciences Study Section, and sits on the editorial boards of the Journal of Dental Research, Journal of Periodontology, Frontiers in Oral Health, Molecular Oral Microbiology, and Current Oral Health Reports. Prior to his current appointments at Buffalo, he served as founding Chair of the Department of Oral Health Sciences and Associate Dean for Research at the Medical University of South Carolina College of Dental Medicine, and held a tenured faculty position at the University of Michigan School of Dentistry. Dr. Kirkwood teaches dental, graduate, and postgraduate students at the University at Buffalo on topics including local and systemic factors in periodontal disease, host modulation, smoking and smoking cessation, osteoclast biology, and clinical translational research. He has trained and mentored more than 40 graduate students, periodontal residents, and postdoctoral fellows over the course of his career. He is available — for both plaintiff and defense — to provide expert opinion, case review, written reports, depositions, and trial testimony in matters involving periodontal disease and periodontitis, dental implants and peri-implantitis, alveolar bone loss, implant failure, periodontal and regenerative surgery, soft tissue grafting, oral cancer, MRONJ and medication-related osteonecrosis of the jaw, standard of care, informed consent, and failure to diagnose.