Dental Tribune Asia Pacific Edition No. 1+2, 2018

08 BUSINESS Dental Tribune Asia Paciﬁ c Edition | 1+2/2018 A whole new dimension of imaging precision By Julia Maciejek, DTI Alvise Reither, the Mi- lan factory manager. He explained that, by changing the factory’s layout and the ﬂ ow of materials, new work- ﬂ ow processes were established. The man- ufacturing plant is continuously expand- ing, and with addi- tional operators, it is able to meet the de- mands of the market. “In this factory, we use the Kanban approach principle, which means that we produce on stock, but ﬁ nal- ise the product based on order. This way, we can balance demand with available capacity,” added Reither. Moreover, ACTEON applies sig- niﬁ cant quality controls during all processes, from the assembly of the core of the machine to ﬁ nal testing, which includes checking of the components and the conﬁ guration of the workstation. According to the factory manager, this procedure has been streamlined signiﬁ cantly in comparison to last year. Reither showed us a large number of testing cabinets containing devices being checked. With complete concentra- tion, employees in front of comput- ers verify the correctness of every step before the X-Mind trium units are distributed. It is in this context that a large quantity of X-Mind trium devices are manufactured, tested and shipped each week. “We have an excellent product quality. We want to ensure a high-quality standard, so employ- ees take turns at the workstations. We also want to make sure that each employee knows and understands all the processes leading up to the ﬁ nalisation of the product, estab- lishing an appreciation of the im- portance of each step in the assem- bly. We further want our employees to respect ACTEON’s standard of quality. This follows the two steps of the quality control: (1) checking that all cables and parts are well assem- bled and (2) testing the machine’s functionality in the testing cabi- nets. Our quality manager also in- spects the components when they are sent to us and before we put them into stock. No parts are assem- bled externally. A mix of compo- nents, cables, mechanical parts, mo- tors and sensors are assembled by hand. That is also part of our quality management,” Reither detailed. Sharp images Excellent image quality is es- sential for treatment planning and diagnosis. In CBCT, exposure is in- corporated in the FOV. This means that only one rotational sequence of the gantry is necessary to acquire Like many ﬁ elds in dentistry, implantology has been trans- formed by technological inno- vations since its humble be- ginnings more than half a cen- tury ago. As the aesthetic and osseointegration properties of implant materials have con- tinued to improve, the num- ber of dental patients opting for implants has risen steadily. With this increase in procedures has come a demand for atraumatic and safe surgery with fewer postsurgical complications. Since 2005, French company ACTEON has established it- self as a leader in digital medical im- aging and high-frequency ultrasonic devices. Supported by its excellent clinical results, ACTEON continues to push the boundaries of what is pos- sible in implantology as it seeks to provide products that optimise both the patient’s and the dentist’s expe- rience. With an emphasis on research and development in dentistry and medicine, ACTEON has successfully expanded its offering and intro- duced several new products earlier this year. Its two multidisciplinary research and development teams and four manufacturing plants are all located in western Europe: in Mérignac (equipment and pharma- ceuticals) and La Ciotat in France (dental imaging), Tuttlingen in Ger- many (medical imaging) and Milan in Italy (dental imaging). These teams work very closely together and production processes are highly controlled owing to their ge- ographical proximity. This is fur- ther enhanced through collabora- tion with international dental sur- geons, leading to the manufacture of devices to ACTEON, deliver the best results for patients through minimally inva- sive and less traumatic treatments. that, according AC T E O N g r a n t e d D e n t a l Tribune International an exclusive look behind the scenes of its 3,200 m2 manu facturing plant in Milan, where many of the compa- ny’s intraoral and extraoral imag- ing devices are produced. The team was proud to introduce its ﬂ agship model: X-Mind trium. This ex- traoral radiographic unit was ﬁ rst introduced at the International Dental Show (IDS) in 2015 and re- ceived a major update just in time for the 2017 fair. It offers a complete range of innovative solutions for di- agnosis and treatment planning. Considerable attention has been paid to image quality and homoge- neity, including X-ray emission, processing, stability and geometry. “X-Mind trium combines CBCT, panoramic and cephalometric im- aging, which is why it is called a three-in-one device,” explained Claudio Giani, director of imaging research and development at the Milan site. He demonstrated that CBCT imaging is accomplished us- ing a rotating gantry with a ﬁ xed X-ray source and a detector. Giani told us that, during the rotation, multiple sequential projection im- ages, ranging from 150 to 450, are acquired to complete the arc. This procedure varies from a conven- tional medical CT scan, which uses a fan-shaped X-ray beam in a heli- cal progression to acquire individ- ual image slices of the ﬁ eld of view (FOV) and then stacks the slices to obtain a 3-D representation. the When we ﬁ rst approached X-Mind trium, we noticed right away the distinctive ergonomics of the radiographic unit. The device has an extremely short U-arm, which moves around the patient during image acquisition phase. This is supported by the pat- ented kinematics and collimation and aids comfortable positioning of the patient’s jaw. The entire sys- tem is designed with ergonomic ef- ﬁ ciency in mind and takes up very little space in the practice room. With a secondary collimator (X-ray tube assembly) installed, the pa- tient is not exposed to additional collimator movements. Excellent quality assurance ACTEON produces high-end quality products that undergo a tried-and-tested quality control process. “The production of X-Mind trium has risen month after month, especially since we ob- tained U.S. Food and Drug Adminis- tration approval and then launched X-Mind trium in the US,” stated enough data for image reconstruc- tion. “In implantology, a CBCT im- age is indispensable for planning simulation and determining the ex- act nerve location. With only one image, the entire dental arch can be visualised, which allows for optimal diagnostic planning possibilities. X-Mind trium has a range of FOV options displayed in detail and without movement artefacts. He rithm has been developed in terms of the graphics processing unit (GPU) and a speciﬁ c type of GPU is installed inside the workstation of X-Mind trium when the CBCT func- tion is conﬁ gured,” explained Giani. This algorithm is used to deter- mine the apparent image deﬁ ni- tion and bone density to facilitate clinical decision-making. The ﬁ lters © Julia Maciejek © Julia Maciejek © Julia Maciejek emphasised that the exposure time is very low and the reconstruction time is three seconds. We saw that, with a cephalometric image, the en- tire maxillofacial area is shown, making it highly suitable for oral and maxillofacial surgeons. Fur- thermore, it has a small voxel size of only 75 μm and a fast re- construction time of 29 seconds. X-Mind trium can be equipped with one or two sensors for an efﬁ cient workﬂ ow. With ACTEON’s expertise in medical imaging, a dedicated ana- lytical algorithm has been imple- mented for X-Mind trium. “We have achieved exceptional results, which are able to provide advanced clini- cal indicators that will be helpful for practitioners in the future,” stated Giani proudly. “The analytical algo- ensure detailed recording of the im- age acquisition by low-noise micro- stepping motors. Low radiation dose With X-Mind trium, high radia- tion exposure is a thing of the past. The low-radiation protocol de- creases the required amount of X-ray emissions by a third using the algebraic reconstruction technique. This means that the radiation dose for the patient can be reduced by 50 to 70 per cent. This low-dose imag- ing guarantees a maximum FOV with minimal radiation exposure to the patient. “This is essential be- cause we do not care only about good images but also about the well-being of the patients,” stated Reither. Furthermore, the software of X-Mind trium monitors radia-

Dental Tribune Asia Pacific Edition No. 1+2, 2018

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