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ePaper created 2017-04-26, 10:06:04 | version 1.38.0
implants_letter to dentists The dilema of ignorance To my colleagues from all over the world! For a long time now I have kept my feelings silent regarding the progress of implant dentistry. When Dean Edward Kaufman was still alive he created the irst and only endowed chair in implant dentistry which he named the Leonard I. Linkow Professorship of Implant Dentistry in perpetuity with me as the recipient. It was to be for the very irst time in the world when all implant modalities and devices would be explo- red, used and evaluated. Did this ever happen??? Never!!! All the academia around the world is “screw” happy. That’s all they know and that’s all they know and the multimillion “dollar screw compa- nies compensate some of them very well. So, why should they not promote these screw companies? Students today are only taught root form im- plants so are the practicing dentists. I just came back from lecturing at one of the maxi courses held in Portland Oregon. I lectured for two days – the irst one I spoke for seven hours. The students were amazed, stunned and frustrated that they never heard a lecture from anyone on blade/plate form implants and subpe- riosteal implants. What a crime – what a disgrace to implant dentistry – what a disaster that the academia continues to ignore these incredibly magniicent implants, their procedures and their longtime successes. Why has this been an ongoing secret? Because very few of the academia know the irst thing about them. Secondly, because the multimillion dollar root form companies from their very beginning were feeding the universities with much of their arma- mentarium and some of their many “presents”. So why should the universities not use them and report mostly positively as to their values. Since there were very few blade/plate form implant companies in business that were “rich” enough to donate their kits etc. to the univer- sities they were ignored and overlooked and hushed to silence or looked upon with negative remarks. Then again, isn’t it easier to give a weekend course on screws and then sell ten to twelve screws per edentulous jaw to the students for an excellent proit and much easier than if they had to teach in the same week-end how to place blade implants and then only have to sell three or four for an edentulous jaw at even a cheaper price per implant? Unfortunately however, the dentists would rather place in ten to twelve screws rather than three or four blades which would accomplish the same results but these dentists would make much more money placing in the screws. What about subperiosteal implants? These are some of the most magniicent and helpful implants ever used especially the tripodal man- dibular subperiosteal implant that I introduced to the profession in 1984, twenty ive years ago. But why would these “non-shelf” implants be popu- larized by these screw companies? Because there is no way that they can make one penny because they cannot sell them. These are implants that have to be designed by dentists and then cast in vitallium or titanium by techni- cians. 42 1_2017 42 implants