Nowadays, dentists have to be good clinicians, skilled high-tech users, comprehensive bosses, emphatic healthcare providers, and much more besides. So it’s hardly surprising that there’s little time left to take smart decisions. The following overview provides, in a nutshell, information about how patients, products and treatments are changing, and the exciting opportunities these developments open up for full-arch professionals who keep themselves up to date.
Trend 1: Active lifestyles of a rapidly growing aging population
The population is constantly aging, with more than 1.4 billion people over 60 expected to be living on our planet in 2030.1 Today’s 60+ year old patients still have a long life expectancy, and a much more active lifestyle than previous generations. Conventional overdentures will not be enough for them anymore!
Trend 2: Increasing willingness to undergo complex treatments
Edentulous patients ask for “fixed teeth” and are willing to undergo the necessary treatment. At the same time, immediate treatments are becoming increasingly popular due to faster treatment times.4 Conventional overdentures are still frequently offered, but expectations are shifting towards more esthetic and functional options as well.
Trend 3: Patients know what they want
About 70 percent of patients state that online reviews of dentists are just as important for them as a dentist’s professional credentials.2 Today’s patients are well informed and aware that implants are a safe solution not only for single tooth replacement. Offering implant treatments for multi-unit indications as well is becoming an important criterion for patients selecting their preferred dental clinic.3
10 full-arch challenges and how you can solve them
Trend 4: Different options for different patients
On average, one full-arch treatment per week is provided by dental professionals in the US, UK, Italy and Germany.4 Dentists require different treatment options that are tailored to the patient’s specific budget.3 Some situations are still best solved with the classic full-arch approach, while other cases can be managed with fewer implants. Here, fixed-hybrid overdentures accounted for the fastest-growing overdenture market segment in 2017.4
Trend 5: Less invasive, less expensive – and faster
Immediate placement and loading protocols are growing twice as fast as classic delayed implant procedures. Patients prefer shorter overall treatment times and less invasive treatments. New protocols offer lower postoperative morbidity and a quicker path to the final restoration, while saving chair time in the practice. Dentists who take these trends into account in full-arch implantology are thus able to gain significantly more new patients.
“Patients are more informed and more interested to move directly from hopeless dentition to a new fixed implant-supported restoration, and clinics actively compete in offering low-cost full-arch rehabilitations. Digital workflows enable the standardization of cases and the use of a wider variety of prosthetic materials.”
Dr. Massimo Frosecchi, Italy
“The main trend I see is in the reduction of implants used for the rehabilitation of the full-arch. This was brought to the notice of the dental implant community especially after scientific evidence-based consensus statements were published in 2018. The improvement in the digital workflow has brought with it better materials to be milled or printed with greater accuracy. Since patients are seeking treatment much earlier, more terminally dentate patients are rehabilitated with fixed prostheses than those with atrophic edentulous jaws.”
Dr. Blackie Swart, South Africa
Trend 6: Digital dentistry technologies
This is another significant megatrend in dentistry that enables more dentists to provide services in the field of implant dentistry by lessening the educational burden. Booming guided surgery services and intraoral scanners within practices facilitate processes and ensure confidence, reliability and precision also for the less trained practitioners. In the very near future, the precise and predictable fully-digital workflow will become a standard in the treatment of edentulous patients too.
Treatment planning with coDiagnostix® (courtesy of Dr. Tadas Korzinkas)
Trend 7: Integrated implant planning workflows with guided surgery
With a steady rise in the number of general practitioners placing implants, the use of guided surgery is experiencing double-digit growth (11%) in Europe. Practitioners who are willing to embrace this technology can benefit from higher treatment predictability, more efficient surgical procedures, and maximization of treatment outcomes through fully digital collaborative planning.
Courtesy of Dr Gustavo Harfagar
Trend 8: Shift toward chairside 3D printers
3D printing reduces chair time and costs and is becoming increasingly popular and affordable. The rapid growth of this market in Europe is stimulating all overdenture segments.
“Digital environments, especially for full-arch patients, are the pinnacle of modern implant dentistry”.
Dr. Luis Cuadrado, Spain
“There is a trend towards digital tools to plan the surgery and the restoration, once a full-arch rehabilitation is indicated. Using such tools we can observe many details and perform treatments with increased accuracy and improved outcomes, especially the chance for successful immediate loading.”
Dr. Waldemar Polido, USA
"Patients ask for immediacy more often – one surgery, one day, immediate teeth. We, as dentists, definitely need not only to be more skilled, but also to be able to use more sophisticated tools to fulfill these demands. In future we will be scanning and printing teeth within one hour of surgery and providing implants that achieve primary stability even in difficult conditions after the extractions, such as the Straumann® BLX Implant System. The implants we already have, the rest will follow very soon."
Dr. Barbara Sobczak, Poland
Trend 9: New levels of esthetics with new materials
New PMMA materials allow for more esthetic solutions in full-arch provisional restorations. Final full-contour zirconia restorations are able to compete with conventional bar restorations.
Courtesy of Dr Luis Cuadrado and Dr Arturo Godoy Senties (Dental Technician)
Trend 10: Cost-effectiveness and predictability
Full-arch treatments with four to six tilted or non-tilted implants have recently reached a completely new level of predictability and cost-effectiveness. Today, clinicians can make use of this technique without compromising on reliability, osseointegration and stability.
The exciting field of full-arch restorations is progressing rapidly. Care providers are challenged with new informed patient behavior, scientific findings, and evolving products and technologies, while the overarching megatrend of digitalization is fertilizing all aspects and steps in the dental treatment workflow . All this is opening up new opportunities to further develop professional skills, increase efficiency and realize new potential for the dental practice.
What trends influence you most and prompt you to make changes in your practice?
