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Decision Making in Dental Implantology

Atlas of Surgical and Restorative Approaches

Mauro Tosta, DDS, MSc, PhD

Gastão Soares de Moura Filho, DDS, MSc, PhD

Leandro Chambrone, DDS, MSc, PhD

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Foreword

With today's rapidly changing and improving technologies available in implant dentistry, the clinician performing surgical and restorative treatments on implant patients must make an appropriate selection of treatment options to achieve successful outcomes for their patients. The demands and expectations of the implant patient today place more pressure on treating clinicians to provide both functional and highly esthetic results. Many teaching and educational courses today focus only on the mechanical aspects needed to provide the dental patient with an implant. Currently, there are too many training courses and textbooks on how to prepare an implant recipient site, how to perform hard and soft tissue augmentation procedures, and subjective management of complications. The biologic principles of osseointegration as introduced by P.-I. Brånemark in the early 1980s are lost or forgotten. The authors of this new textbook have clearly and sequentially moved through the stages of managing an implant patient. They have returned to the scientific and biologic basis of implant dentistry by providing evidence-based principles. Using the clinical practice guidelines established by the American Dental Association, the recommendations made in this textbook have included rankings for implant procedures based on the strength of the literature and level of scientific evidence.

The textbook takes the reader through every clinical scenario, from the fully edentulous to partially edentulous, including the patient missing a single tooth. The chapters clearly delineate the different thought processes the clinician must go through when treating the functional (posterior) zone versus the esthetic (anterior) zone. The chapters are very well illustrated with the authors' documented cases, highlighting the concepts and biologic principles that the surgical and restorative team must consider. There is equal focus on the restorative and surgical aspects of implant dentistry and procedures for both specialties are thoroughly covered with systematic reviews followed by a measurement of strength and level of certainty for the treatment recommendations.

The publication of this textbook is timely and surely will become the go-to reference for clinicians actively providing dental implant treatment for their patients and seeking evidence-based approaches to treating their implant patients.

Peter K. Moy, DMD
Nobel Biocare Endowed Chair, Surgical Implant Dentistry
Director, Straumann Surgical Implant Dental Center
Clinical Professor, Department of Oral & Maxillofacial Surgery
UCLA, School of Dentistry

Decision Making in Dental Implantology

Decision making’ is a key to the successful management of patients, particularly when dental implants are considered beneficial to the achievement of the treatment goals. Many factors come together to bring predictability to treatment outcomes and each is given appropriate, chronologically correct consideration in this Atlas. The holistic approach to presentation of information by the authors is refreshing and timely in an era where patient centered philosophies are coming to the fore.

The authors appropriately consider and interpret the scientific foundation for clinical decision making, and through recognition of publication quality increase the credibility of information provided in subsequent chapters. Interpretation of the evidence by clinicians with superior training and experience is seen, through the excellent clinical presentations, to result in patient rehabilitations that are sound functionally and pleasing from the esthetic perspective. Importantly, the reader can rely on the protocols presented through patient care as a result of the diagnostic and treatment acumen presented.

The patient documentation is meticulous and of the highest quality and their treatment recommendations are both understandable and usable by the reader. This is important because the information provided will ultimately result in benefit to a broader spectrum of patients. By presenting patient related information as comprehensive treatments, the authors encourage treatment teams to consider this treatment approach.

The authors are to be commended for their efforts. This Atlas provides a benchmark for quality treatment outcomes both now and in the future. Congratulations on bringing a valuable addition to the information base related to patient care utilizing dental implants.

Dean Morton, BDS, MS, FACP
Chairman, Department of Prosthodontics
Indiana University School of Dentistry
Director, American Board of Prosthodontics
Member, Board of Directors, ITI

Preface

We all know that the advances in the field of dentistry, the ever-changing area of the evidence base, and the sometimes dazzling array of proposals for new treatment procedures would make it seem that the basic concepts of treatment may no longer be a reality. Indeed, this is not true. This new book, Decision Making in Dental Implantology: An Atlas of Surgical and Restorative Approaches, came to join together important basic biologic and surgical procedures of periodontology and implantology with the most predictable and well-established treatment approaches available in the literature.

We have tackled the important task of writing an atlas, focusing attention on the management of predictable dental implant treatment approaches in order to achieve significantly positive clinical functional and esthetic results, based on well-established prosthodontic procedures. It is anticipated that the proposal of any treatment approach for the various clinical scenarios must be based on a concept of having the best source of evidence shared within a large audience. In this atlas, we tried to achieve that key idea (i.e. to establish the best practical way to treat patients with implant dentistry procedures).

More than a simple “beautiful presentation of cases,” we tried to work with professionalism and passion to present the most solid treatment options clinicians may face during daily practice. This atlas is the outcome of more than 20 years of experience in the field of implant dentistry, in private practice as well in clinical education.

About the Authors

Mauro Tosta, DDS, MSc, PhD, is a specialist in Periodontology and Dental Implantology, an ITI Fellow and Speaker, and owns a private practice focused on Esthetic Dentistry, Oral Rehabilitation, Periodontics and Implantology in São Paulo, Brazil.

Gastão Soares de Moura Filho, DDS, MSc, PhD, is a Fellow and Speaker of the Brazilian Section of ITI – International Team for Oral Implantology, and is in private practice in São Paulo, Brazil.

Leandro Chambrone, DDS, MSc, PhD, is an Associate Professor in the Unit of Basic Oral Investigation (UIBO) at El Bosque University in Bogotá, Colombia and Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Periodontology at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa, USA.