Current status and future of robotic surgery in implant therapy

Abstract

In the field of implant dentistry, it is no doubt that diagnostic imaging is important, and information technology (IT) has been already introduced to constitute three dimensional(3D) images of joe bones at the beginning of 21 century. In addition, introduction and development of IT enabled us to perform the simulation of not only implant surgery but also crown placement on the exclusive software. Moreover, the simulated position of implants can be reproduced in the patient mouth using surgical guide made by CAD/CAM. Consequently, application of those techniques established the immediate restoration termed as One Day Treatment. Recently, Dynamic navigation system was also developed, in which simulation of implant surgery was performed, images of drills and joes are superimposed, and ideal drill position was shown on PC monitor as the real time navigation. Thus, application of IT to implant therapy has been spreading and robot surgery has been developed as the next generation therapy. So far, limited data has been reported and clinical use is not available. However, drastic change and paradigm shift might be occurred, depending on the innovation of the specialized software, in this field.