A Novel Type of Dental Tube Implant for Areas with Limited Bone Height. Clinical and Radiographic Data from Three Patients with 5-Year Follow-Up

Background: Alternative implant designs may reduce the need for complicated and costly bone augmentation procedures in situations with limited bone height. Purpose: Wide dental tube implants have been manufactured and tested in three patients and followed for 5 years to evaluate if such implants are capable to support fixed prosthetic constructions with good prognosis in areas with limited bone height. Materials and Methods: Four machined-tube implants with a height of 6 mm, an outer diameter of 7.4 mm, and an inner diameter of 6.0 mm were placed in three patients. After a healing period of 3 months, ceramometal suprastructures were constructed to supply the implants. Annual clinical and radiographical follow-ups were done up to 5 years. At the 5-year follow-up, all three patients were examined with a cone beam computed tomography technique. Results: All implants and the suprastructures were clinically stable after 5 years. In one patient, vertical bone loss and a 6-mm deep pocket appeared after 1 year. The pocket has remained throughout the observation period and has been regularly debrided and kept it free from clinical signs of inflammation. In the other two patients, the soft tissue surrounding the implants was in good health with no or only slight inflammation throughout all observations. Pocket probing revealed no or slight bleeding and pocket depths amounting to less than 3 mm. Conclusion: It was shown that this new type of implant will function excellent during follow-up times of several years. Further studies should be done to explore in more detail indications for such implants.