Hilario Pellicer-Chover

Objective: The objective of the study was to evaluate the relation between occlusal loading and peri-implant crevicular fluid cytokine expression in patients with implant-supported complete fixed prostheses in both arches. Material and methods: A prospective longitudinal clinical study was performed at a university clinic. Fifteen patients were selected and 11 were included. All patients had bimaxillary implant-supported complete fixed ceramo-metallic prostheses loaded at least 12 months before the beginning of the study. Allocation was established for each patient using a computerized occlusal analysis system. The test implant was the maxillary implant closest to the point of highest occlusal loading. The maxillary implant with least loading was the control implant. Occlusal adjustment was performed using a round diamond burr. This occlusal distribution was verified with the occlusal analysis system. Expression of cytokines from peri-implant crevicular fluid (TNF-α, IL-10, IL-6, IL-1β, IL-8) were recorded and analyzed in both test and control implants before (baseline: T0) and 2 (T1) and 12 months (T2) after occlusal adjustment. The Brunner-Langer non-parametric test was performed. Results: At T0, the expression of IL-10 was significantly higher in the test group implants (p = 0.018). Between T0 and T1, the expression of all the cytokines decreased in the implants of both groups with statistically significant differences, except for TNF (p = 0.271). When comparing both groups at T1, there was no statistically significant difference in any of the analyzed cytokines. At T2, TNF-α suffered when compared with baseline, a statistical decrease in both study and control implants (p < 0,001). At T2, there were no statistically significant differences between groups in any of the cytokines analyzed. Conclusions: Implants with higher occlusal load presented higher expression of IL-10 in peri-implant crevicular fluid. Occlusal adjustment produced a decrease in the expression of all the analyzed cytokines, both in test and control implants.

Objective: An in vitro study was made to compare mean thermal variation according to the material, design and wear of the surgical drills used during dental implant site preparation. Material and methods: Three study groups (stainless steel drills with straight blades; diamond-like carbon-coated drills with straight blades; and diamond-like carbon-coated drills with twisted blades) were tested to compare material, design and wear of the surgical drill in terms of overall mean values (complete sequence of drills) and specific mean values (each drill separately). The groups comprised four drills: initial, pilot, progressive and final drill. Implant site configuration was performed through an intermittent and gradual drilling technique without irrigation at 800 rpm in standardized synthetic blocks. Maximum axial loading of two kilograms was controlled by an automatic press. Each surgical drill was submitted to 50 drillings and was sterilized every five uses. A thermographic camera analyzed the mean thermal changes. The software-controlled automatic press kept systematic drilling, axial loading and operational speed constant without any human intervention. Student’s t-test, ANOVA and multiple linear regression models were performed. The level of significance was 5% (p = 0.05). Results: The overall mean comparison between the stainless steel and diamond-like carbon-coated materials showed no statistically significant differences (p > 0.05), though specific mean comparison showed statistically significant differences between the drills of the different groups (p < 0.05). The twisted blades exhibited less overall and specific mean thermal variation than straight blades for the progressive and final drills (p < 0.01). In addition, the initial and pilot drills showed a greater mean thermal change than the progressive and final drills. The mean thermal variation was seen to increase during the 50 drillings. Conclusions: Within the limitations of this study, it can be concluded that the drill material did not significantly influence the overall mean thermal variation except for the pilot drill. The drill design affected overall and specific mean thermal variation since the twisted blades heated less than the straight blades. The initial and pilot drills increased the specific mean thermal variation with respect to the progressive and final drills. In addition, all drills in each group produced a gradual increase in mean temperature during the 50 drillings.