Short dental implants: Does size really matter?

Abstract

Placement of implants in the posterior part of jaws remains complicated due to difficult approach, close approximity and fear of perforating the maxillary sinus. Hence, many techniques for providing fixed prosthesis in atrophic jaws have been tried including iliac crestal bone augmentation, mandibular nerve repositioning, sinus floor elevation, and distraction osteogenesis. However, these techniques remain unpredictable with insufficient documented data calibrating their success and remain invasive for the patient. The introduction of short dental implants (SDIs) tends to overcome more than many difficulties experienced by the operator in carrying out above procedures. Furthermore, less invasiveness, decreased chair side time and patient acceptance and comfort for SDIs have led to clinicians preferring them over other modalities. Aspects like decrease in length of these unique implants has been questioned over years thus challenging their success rate. This review on SDIs takes us through the concept, salient features, factors to be considered and clinical feasibility of SDIs thus giving the reader a broader outlook over them.