Case Details
This is a 76 year old patient that has failing teeth in her upper arch due to many years of neglect. She finally decided to extract all of her upper teeth and to get a full-arch nonremovable or fixed implant segmented bridge prosthesis in zirconia material but did not want any vertical bone reduction performed in her mouth that is common for many full-arch implant cases. Fortunately for the patient, she was a candidate for a fixed and cement-retained implant prosthesis that did not require bone alveoloplasty (or vertical bone reduction) to begin with. This would limit the treatment to the replacement of her teeth only and not to both her soft tissues (gums) and teeth. As a result, removal of bone from the alveolar ridge in her mouth was not required and was avoided.
In order to qualify for this type of implant prothesis (prosthetic classification FP-1), there are some criteria that must be met such as there must be an adequate amount of bone volume that’s available for the placement of 8-12 implants (as the number of implants increases, so does the cost) and the allowance of these implants to be placed at precise arch positions or ideal tooth site locations (with a FP-3, the implants could be placed anywhere in the arch since the prosthetic attachments that are connected to the implants are hidden within the substructure of the implant prosthesis).
Therefore, this is the most desired type of prosthesis for patients but is also one of the less common types that are completed by patients due to the criteria that was mentioned.
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Description: Full-Arch Implant Prosthesis of type FP-1 (classification 1 fixed prosthesis that restores only the tooth) are fixed and are oral implant prostheses that replace the missing teeth only and does not replace any missing bone or soft tissues (gums). When vertical bone reduction occurs to the alveolar bone, the oral prostheses that is often made is of type FP-3 (classification 3 fixed prosthesis that restores the tooth and supporting bone with soft tissue). The main reasons for the vertical bone reduction are to create a wider bed for the placement of implants, to level the bone and remove irregularities in the arch, to hide the transition line under the smile line (to improve esthetics), and to create the necessary space for the prosthetic parts.
