implants0112

I overview some implant manufacturers. The development of some of these companies over the past 15 years, the size of their companies and the number of their em- ployees today are indeed impressive. And these pros- perouscompaniesshareothercharacteristicsaswell: the acquisition of products and entire firms in order to expand or supplement their product portfolio and their pressing on to the field of digital dentistry (CAD/CAM, planning, etc.), into which these global playersinvestlargesumsofmoney.Revenuesmustbe generated so that these investments can be made— and they are still made, albeit declining owing to the economic crisis. Still,theimplantmarketisbooming.Althoughthe consistentlytwo-digitannualgrowthratessomeim- plant manufacturers had started to become used to have become more moderate today, a great deal of money can be made with implants. As a result, an ever-increasingnumberofimplantsuppliersandsys- temsmakeitimpossiblefortheindividualusertokeep track.Asidefromnewsystems,anincreasingnumber of generics are being launched on the market. _Focus on red-white aesthetics ThePresidentoftheGermanSocietyforDentalIm- plantology (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Zahnärztliche Implantologie), Prof Frank Palm, aptly remarked, “What was celebrated as a triumph for some col- leagues20yearsagoistodaytakentocourt.”Dentists whopractisedimplantologywerenotpreparedtofind themselvesconfrontedwithadebatethathadspread fromNorthAmericatoEurope:thatofred–whiteaes- thetics. This new focus on achieving the highest pos- sible aesthetics for implant-prosthetic treatments was linked to implantology and distanced itself from surgery,whichhadbeendominantupuntilthattime. Intheearlyphaseofimplantology,themainfocus was on safe placement and the best possible place- ment in the bone, sometimes even at the expense of subsequent prosthesis treatment owing to un- favourableplacementoftheartificialabutmentteeth. Now, however, prosthetic standards and issues have becomethecentreofthediscussion.Placementtech- niques were modified and new techniques were es- tablished in order to satisfy these requirements. Pa- tientsnolonger,oronlyoccasionally,acceptdemand- ing and complex cases like the following case. Bothimplantsintheanteriormaxillaryregionwere placedtoofarbuccally,andtherewasagapof5.5mm between the implant shoulder and the cemento- enamel junction of the adjacent teeth ( Figs. 8–10). Treatment with a long-term temporary restoration would only have yielded an unsatisfactory aesthetic result. However, under certain surgical and dental conditions—as shown in our second example—supe- rior results and stability for a period of ten years can beachievedevenwithchallenginginitialsituations.In 1999, an immediate implant was placed in region 12. The following images show the steps of treatment (Figs. 11–13). The last image shows the condition af- ter ten years (Fig. 14). This development was made possible mainly by massiveimprovementsintheareaofaugmentations, 08 I implants1_2012 Fig. 11 Fig. 12Fig. 10 Fig. 14 Fig. 15Fig. 13