Abstract
The most common facial prosthetic material is silicone elastomer. The ideal characteristics and biological properties of facial prostheses should be similar to those of the facial part or tissue, including elasticity and dimensional and color stability. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the viscoelastic properties of three silicone materials for facial prostheses. Two experimental silicone materials （KRS-10 and KRS-C1, GC Corp） and a commercially available material （A-2186F, Factor Ⅱ） were examined. Cylindrical-shaped specimens were prepared. All specimens were stored in water at 37ºC, and measured after storage for 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, and 3 months. Five specimens of each material were tested with a creep meter. The viscoelastic properties among materials and storage conditions were analyzed with the two-way analysis of variance （ANOVA） and Tukey’s multiple comparison test. All silicone materials exhibited mainly elastic behavior. The viscoelastic properties of KRS-C1 and A-2186F showed almost the same behavior, and the elastic displacement of KRS-10 after 24 hours was greater than that of the others, but that after 1 week was not significantly different from that of the other materials. KRS-10 was the softest silicone material in this study, and was influenced by aging.
