Horizontal Dental Implant with Ball-and-Socket Attachment
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Solution Overview
Problem
Traditional dental implants and overdentures often require bone grafts, are unsuitable for patients with resorbed ridges or tori, and cause discomfort due to direct biting on bony edges, leading to complications and impaired speech and eating abilities.
Innovation Solution
A horizontally-placed dental implant system with ball-and-socket attachments that eliminates the need for bone grafts, allows for bone rebuilding, reduces healing time, and distributes biting forces across multiple points, enabling comfortable eating and speaking by attaching overdentures without direct force on the implant.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If traditional vertical dental implants are used, then the implant can be securely anchored in the bone, but the patient requires bone grafts and extensive healing time (12 months or more)
Solution Approach 1:
The patent inverts the traditional vertical implant orientation by using horizontal implants placed in the lateral aspect of the mandible or maxilla. This inversion allows the implant to engage the dense cortical bone on the lateral surface, providing secure anchoring without requiring vertical bone height that would necessitate grafting, thereby reducing healing time while maintaining reliability
2Strength
If traditional vertical dental implants are used, then the implant provides structural support, but it causes discomfort when patients bite directly on bony edges
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary mechanism - a resilient or flexible connector between the horizontal implant and the overdenture. This intermediary absorbs and distributes biting forces, preventing direct transmission of occlusal loads to the bone-implant interface, thereby maintaining structural support while eliminating discomfort during eating
3Reliability
If palatal coverage is used in traditional overdentures, then the overdenture provides adequate coverage and support, but it interferes with the patient's ability to eat and taste food
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts the palatal coverage requirement by using horizontal implants placed in the lateral aspect of the arch. This extraction eliminates the need for extensive palatal coverage to provide support, as the horizontal implants anchored in the lateral bone provide adequate stability, thereby preserving the patient's ability to eat and taste food
4Adaptability or versatility
If traditional overdentures are used, then the overdenture replaces missing teeth, but it negatively impacts speech, appearance, and tongue movement
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the support function from the coverage function by using localized horizontal implants rather than extensive overdenture coverage. This segmentation allows the overdenture to be more minimal and less intrusive, providing tooth replacement functionality while preserving natural tongue movement and speech patterns
Data Source
AI summary
Apparatus is provided for overdenture with horizontal implant. The apparatus presented comprises an overdenture and a horizontal implant. The horizontal implant is surgically implanted onto the patient's maxilla or mandible, typically on the outside of the bone. The overdenture and the horizontal implant have attachment components which couple together to attach the overdenture to the horizontal implant. The attachment components may comprise ball-and-socket attachments, with the ball components affixed to the overdenture and the socket components affixed to the horizontal implants. The present invention solves problems with currently available dental implants and overdentures.