title: Clinical study evaluating the discrepancy of two different impression techniques of four implants in an edentulous jaw.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Precise implant-supported prosthodontics requires accurate impressions. Many in vitro studies comparing different implant impression techniques were performed. The purpose of this in vivo study was to compare the discrepancy of two different impression techniques of implants clinically.
  
  
  METHODS
  Four implants were inserted nearly bilateral in ten edentulous jaws. From each jaw, two different impressions (A, transfer; B, splinted pick-up) were taken. Respectively two stone casts of each jaw were produced and scan bodies were mounted on the lab analogues to digitize the casts. One scan body of the digitized casts was each superimposed and the deviations of the remaining three scan bodies were measured three dimensionally. The fit of the suprareconstructions was evaluated clinically on both casts and in the mouth.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The mean discrepancy of scan body 2 was 192 μm (±96), 282 μm (±97) for scan body 3, and 366 μm (±114) for scan body 4. The discrepancies between two scan bodies were statistically significant (p ≤ 0.010; ANOVA test). Comparing the data with the span between the scan bodies, a linear regression line could be drawn to show the dependency between the misfit and the length of the span. Clinically, the fit on the cast produced by the splinted pick-up technique was favorable.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The discrepancy between the splinted pick-up impression technique and the transfer technique were in a range with clinical influence.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  For better accuracy of implant-supported prosthodontics, the splinted pick-up technique should be used for impressions of four implants evenly spread in edentulous jaws.
authors.affiliation: Private Practice for Oral Surgery, Josef-Heilingbrunnerstrasse 2, 93413, Cham, Germany, michael.stimmelmayr@med.uni-muenchen.de.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Stimmelmayr
authors.forename: Jan-Frederik
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Güth
authors.forename: Kurt
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Erdelt
authors.forename: Arndt
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Happe
authors.forename: Markus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Schlee
authors.forename: Florian
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Beuer
mesh_terms: D003761:Dental Impression Technique; D019094:Dental Prosthesis, Implant-Supported; D006801:Humans; D007575:Jaw, Edentulous / Q000473:pathology*