Abstract

Today, people are living longer and hopefully keeping their teeth longer. There are modalities of dental treatment that can correct tooth loss and bone loss with adequate substitutes that emulate “the real thing.” Bone loss, a disease symptom which can occur from multi-variants, can lead to subsequent tooth loss and an inability to replace these lost teeth. Dentists have long attempted to find ways of replacing missing teeth with endosseous, as well as subperiosteal implant techniques. Blade implants were the treatment of the 1950’s; whereby a small length-wise slit was made on the edentulous ridge to a depth conducive to “tapping” a stainless steel, flat fixture into the bone. Depending upon the width and depth of the surrounding bone, the blade implant could be used to hold single and/or multiple crowns. Trial and error led to the advent of the cylindrical, square, peg-shaped or rounded and oblong implants made of titanium and other osseo-integrative materials.
Eventually, hydroxyl-appetite coated implants came into use and proved more successful than the standard blade type implant. The “coated” implants were more predictable and lasted longer, especially when coated with “plasma spray”. Older individuals with more discretionary income, who may have been conditioned and committed to saving their teeth, were the more obvious patients opting for implant tooth replacement. Many factors that figured into the equation of whether the implant would “take” or not had to be considered before an implant could be delivered as the treatment of choice. Today, in conjunction with these various factors of viability and disease, considerations for recommending an implant as a replacement for a missing tooth should be given the highest and priority as it has become the Standard of Care.