In Vivo Accuracy of Two Intraoral Scanning Systems in Detecting Two Inter-foraminal Implants in the Edentulous Mandible.

Today, tooth- or implant-supported single crowns and short-span fixed partial dentures can be fabricated on the basis of an intraoral scan, but the scanning accuracy decreases with increasing length of the jaw section to be captured. An accurate scan is also made more difficult by edentulous jaw sections, as these provide the scanner with few landmarks for proper three-dimensional image composition.

With respect to both edentulous and edentulous patients with dental implants, the currently available literature does not provide a firm basis for deciding whether such patients can already be scanned with sufficient accuracy. It is considered problematic in this context that the findings on digital impression accuracy, regardless of whether teeth or implants have been scanned, are based almost exclusively on the results of in vitro studies. Conclusions about the accuracy of intraoral scanners under clinical conditions with moving patients and limited accessibility to the structures to be imaged, especially in the presence of blood, saliva or sulcus fluid, are extremely limited based on these data.

Therefore, the aim of this study is to determine the clinical scanning accuracy of two current intraoral scanning systems for the three-dimensional acquisition of the position of two interforaminal dental implants in the edentulous mandible. The influence of artificial landmarks to achieve increased scan accuracy will also be tested.