Dental Implants - New Horizons in Diagnosis and Treatment Planning

The major difficulties associated with dental implant placement are related to inadequate quantity and quality of available bone at the proposed implant site. Placement of implant in sites with inadequate bone may cause complications such as impingement on vital anatomic structures such as the mandibular canal and neurovascular bundle, and perforation of cortical plates by implant threads.

In an effort to overcome such anatomic problems, a short implant may be required and could be too short to sustain the occlusal loads to which the resulting prosthesis will be subjected. Normal bone, and especially bone of poor quality, placed under such levels of functional loading mayresult in microfractures of the bone adjacent to the imnplant. This in turn can result in loss of osseointegration.

Furthermore, when implants are placed in bone of poor quality, they often lack adequate initial stability. Micromovement of the implant of as little as 100 microns causes a fibrous rather than bony union, producing an increased incidence of short- or long-term implant failure.

Click this link to read more about techniques to ensure implant success.

Cat Scans Aid Dental Implant Diagnosis

Dentist have a variety of radiographs available for implant diagnosis and treatment planning. These include periapical, panoramic, conventional tomography, and computer-assisted tomography.
The panoramic radiograph is the most frequently used dental x-ray for dental implant treatment and is also the least accurate. Distortion can range from 25 to 30percent.
Conventional tomography also exhibits considerable distortion and lacks the uninterrupted continuity of a three-dimensional image.
Cone Beam CT (CBCT) scanning provides the clinician the advantage of a three-dimensional image with the least distortion, an average of 0.2 to 0.5mm. Anatomic structures can be seen in their entirety without superimposition and with superior magnification, sharpness and significantly reduced distortion in relation to other radiography.
This makes CBCT a more precise diagnostic tool which provides greater clinical confidence in the placement of dental implants than convention radiography.
To read more about dental implant diagnosis and treatment planning, visit Dr. I. Stephen Brown at www.theperiogroup.com.