664 Theories and techniques of oral implantology

it is hoped that more and more operators will expand the horizons of these useful devices. Among some of the areas currently being investigated are the following.

Pedodontics. The child who has just lost his central or lateral incisor as a result of traumatic injury can be helped by an endodontic root stabilizer. The tooth may be replaced in its socket and stabilized by the endodontic pin. The pin gives immediate support and also may help retain the tooth, if and when its root resorbs. A long and narrow single tooth blade can be used where an incisor tooth had been lost for several months, after the socket has healed.

Tripod implants may be used as space maintainers, thereby involving no other teeth, as is the case with routine space-maintaining procedures. If used for such a purpose, the operator should be very careful that the deepest portions of the triplant pins completely circumvent the crowns of unerupted permanent bicuspid teeth.

Periodontia. Unfortunately, when only two or three loose teeth are all that remain in a dental arch, the periodontist is at a disadvantage. After he treats these teeth, eliminates the inflammatory tissue, and reduces existing infrabony pockets, he knows that a removable prosthesis will only promote the future loss of these teeth. Even if the few remaining teeth are splinted to one another, the removable appliance will eventually cause the splinted teeth to loosen. If,

however, these teeth can be splinted with a full arch fixed denture supported by strategically placed implants firmly embedded in bone, the long-term prognosis would certainly be more optimistic.

Oral surgery. Endosseous implants of the blade type can be strategically placed on both sides of a fracture in a completely edentulous jaw. After the fracture has been reduced, the implants can be stabilized with a fixed superstructure to immobilize it (Fig. 15-111). By this technique it may not be necessary to inconvenience the patient with an external fixation method.

Miscellaneous uses. The psychologically disturbed patient who cannot tolerate the thought of a re-movable complete denture or partial prosthesis may be satisfied with implants combined with a fixed denture or palateless removable maxillary dentures with internal "clip-on" attachments. Feelings of self-assurance, confidence, and youthfulness are just a few of the benefits derived from the introduction of implants.

Implants may also play a very important role in the lives of those unfortunate patients who, either from birth or later, were striken with some debilitating disease. Since they are unable to insert or care for a removable appliance, their comfort and health may be improved by the introduction of endosseous implants utilized as abutments for fixed bridgework.