A dental implant is a "root" device, usually made of titanium, used in dentistry to support restorations that resemble a tooth or group of teeth to replace missing teeth.Virtually all dental implants placed today are root-form endosseous implants, i.e., they appear similar to an actual tooth root (and thus possess a "root-form") and are placed within the bone (endo- being the Greek prefix for "in" and osseous referring to "bone").

Video : Nobel Biocare

y can also be used as anchorage for orthodontic tooth movement. The use of dental implants permits undirectional tooth movement without reciprocal action.

Composition

A typical implant consists of a titanium screw (resembling a tooth root) with a roughened or smooth surface. The majority of dental implants are made out of commercially pure titanium, which is available in 4 grades depending upon the amount of carbon and iron contained. More recently grade 5 titanium has increased in use. Grade 5 titanium, Titanium 6AL-4V, (signifying the Titanium alloy containing 6% Aluminium and 4% Vanadium alloy) is believed to offer similar osseointegration levels as commercially pure titanium. Ti- 6Al-4V alloy offers better tensile strength and fracture resistance. Today most implants are still made out of commercially pure titanium (grades 1 to 4) but some implant systems are fabricated out of the Ti-6Al-4V alloy. Implant surfaces may be modified by plasma spraying, anodizing, etching, or sandblasting to increase the surface area and osseointegration potential of the implant. Recent studies have suggested that the chemical modification of the implant surface by polyelectrolyte coating  or nanoscale roughness manipulation  enhance cell proliferation and differentiation and promote osseointegration.

Training

There is no specialty recognized by the ADA for dental implants in the United States. Implant surgery may be performed as an outpatient procedure under general anesthesia, oral conscious sedation, nitrous oxide sedation, intravenous sedation or under local anesthesia by trained and certified clinicians including general dentists, oral surgeons, periodontists, and prosthodontists.

The legal training requirements for dentists who carry out implant treatment differ from country to country. In the UK, implant dentistry is considered by the General Dental Council to be a postgraduate sphere of dentistry. In other words it is not sufficiently covered during the teaching of the university dental degree course and dentists wishing to practice in dental implantology legally need to undergo additional formal postgraduate training. The General Dental Council has published strict guidelines on the training required for a dentist to be able to place dental implants in general dental practice. UK dentists need to complete a competency assessed postgraduate extended learning program before providing implant dentistry to patients.

The degree to which both graduate and post-graduate dentists receive training in the surgical placement of implants varies from country to country, but it seems likely that lack of formal training will lead to higher complication rates.

In the United States, there are two surgical specialties available for dental graduates to gain multiple years of surgical training in placing dental implants; Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons and Periodontist. United States Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons are required to complete an additional 4 years of post-dental training or 6 years if a medical degree is obtained, and Periodontal Surgeons are required to complete 30–36 months of additional post-graduate training. However, with increasing competition and marketing by major implant manufacturers, dentist seeking to learn how to place and/or restore dental implants can take a weekend or week-long implant training courses available through most major manufacturers. These hands-on courses rely on simulated models and patient examples to emphasize treatment planning, case selection, implant placement protocol, restorative techniques, and marketing strategies. Ultimately, patients are responsible for researching the qualifications of their treating provider that can impact their final surgical and restorative outcome.

Surgical procedure

Surgical planning

Prior to commencement of surgery, careful and detailed planning is required to identify vital structures such as the inferior alveolar nerve or the sinus, as well as the shape and dimensions of the bone to properly orient the implants for the most predictable outcome. Two-dimensional radiographs, such as orthopantomographs or periapicals are often taken prior to the surgery. Sometimes, a CT scan will also be obtained. Specialized 3D CAD/CAM computer programs may be used to plan the case.

Whether CT-guided or manual, a 'stent' may sometimes be used to facilitate the placement of implants. A surgical stent is an acrylic wafer that fits over either the teeth, the bone surface or the mucosa (when all the teeth are missing) with pre-drilled holes to show the position and angle of the implants to be placed. The surgical stent may be produced using stereolithography following computerized planning of a case from the CT scan. CT guided surgery may double the cost compared to more commonly accepted approaches.

Basic procedure

In its most basic form, the placement of an implant requires a preparation into the bone using either hand osteotomes or precision drills with highly regulated speed to prevent burning or pressure necrosis of the bone. After a variable amount of time to allow the bone to grow on to the surface of the implant (osseointegration), a crown or crowns can be placed on the implant. Unlike conventional dental implants, Mini dental implants may be loaded immediately and still have a high survival rate (94%). The amount of time required to place an implant will vary depending on the experience of the practitioner, the quality and quantity of the bone and the difficulty of the individual situation.

Detail procedure

At edentulous (without teeth) jaw sites, a pilot hole is bored into the recipient bone, taking care to avoid the vital structures (in particular the inferior alveolar nerve or IAN and the mental foramen within the mandible). Drilling into jawbone usually occurs in several separate steps. The pilot hole is expanded by using progressively wider drills (typically between three and seven successive drilling steps, depending on implant width and length). Care is taken not to damage the osteoblast or bone cells by overheating. A cooling saline or water spray keeps the temperature of the bone to below 47 degrees Celsius (approximately 117 degrees Fahrenheit). The implant screw can be self-tapping, and is screwed into place at a precise torque so as not to overload the surrounding bone (overloaded bone can die, a condition called osteonecrosis, which may lead to failure of the implant to fully integrate or bond with the jawbone). Typically in most implant systems, the osteotomy or drilled hole is about 1mm deeper than the implant being placed, due to the shape of the drill tip. Surgeons must take the added length into consideration when drilling in the vicinity of vital structures.

Surgical incisions

Traditionally, an incision is made over the crest of the site where the implant is to be placed. This is referred to as a 'flap'. Some systems allow for 'flapless' surgery where a piece of mucosa is punched-out from over the implant site. Proponents of 'flapless' surgery believe that it decreases recovery time while its detractors believe it increases complication rates because the edge of bone cannot be visualized. Because of these visualization problems flapless surgery is often carried out using a surgical guide constructed following computerized 3D planning of a pre-operative CT scan.

Healing time

The amount of time required for an implant to become osseointegrated is a hotly debated topic. Consequently the amount of time that practitioners allow the implant to heal before placing a restoration on it varies widely. In general, practitioners allow 2–6 months for healing but preliminary studies show that early loading of implant may not increase early or long term complications. Minimally invasive methods of early dental implant placement reduce the cost of installed implants and shorten the implant-prosthetic rehabilitation time to within 4–6 months. If the implant is loaded too soon, it is possible that the implant may move which results in failure. For conventional implants, the subsequent time to heal, possibly graft, and eventually place a new implant may take up to eighteen months. For this reason many are reluctant to push the envelope for healing.

One-stage, two-stage surgery

When an implant is placed, either a 'healing abutment', which comes through the mucosa, is placed or a 'cover screw' which is flush with the surface of the dental implant is placed. When a cover screw is placed, the mucosa covers the implant while it integrates then a second surgery is completed to place the healing abutment.

Two-stage surgery is sometimes chosen when a concurrent bone graft is placed or surgery on the mucosa may be required for aesthetic reasons. The latter is usually important where an implant is placed in the "aesthetic zone". This allows more control over the healing and as a result the predictability of the final result. Some implants are one piece so that no healing abutment is required.

In carefully selected cases, patients can be implanted and restored in a single surgery, in a procedure labeled "Immediate Loading". In such cases a provisional prosthetic tooth or crown is shaped to avoid the force of the bite transferring to the implant while it integrates with the bone.

Surgical timing

There are different approaches to place dental implants after tooth extraction. The approaches are:

According to the timing of loading of dental implants, the procedure of loading could be classified into:

Immediate placement

An increasingly common strategy to preserve bone and reduce treatment times includes the placement of a dental implant into a recent extraction site. In addition, immediate loading is becoming more common as success rates for this procedure are now acceptable. This can cut months off the treatment time and in some cases a prosthetic tooth can be attached to the implants at the same time as the surgery to place the dental implants. Because one of three implants requires a minimum addition of bone tissue, surgical techniques for underlying bone augmentation are currently under a large scale development.

Most data suggests that when implants are placed into single rooted tooth sites with healthy bone and mucosa around them, the success rates are comparable to that of delayed procedures with no additional complications.

"Fast and fixed" are similar surgical concepts whereby implants are placed on the same day and a fixed prosthesis is attached to them. This allows the patient to leave with a fixed solution as opposed having to make do with a removal temporary prosthesis whilst the implant osseointegrates with the bone. This concept is appropriate for completely edentulous jaws where either the teeth are to be extracted or have already been removed.

Use of CT scanning

This shows eight dental implants superimposed over the lower jaw in areas of maximum bone and four teeth that will be extracted.

When computed tomography or, more specifically, cone beam computed tomography or CBCT (3D X-ray imaging) is used preoperatively to accurately pinpoint vital structures including the inferior alveolar canal, the mental foramen, and the maxillary sinus, the chances of complications might be reduced as is chairtime and number of visits. Cone beam CT scanning, when compared to traditional medical CT scanning, utilizes less than 2% of the radiation, provides more accuracy in the area of interest, and is safer for the patient. CBCT allows the surgeon to create a surgical guide, which allows the surgeon to accurately angle the implant into the ideal space.