The application of 3D additive printing for the making of medical devices is now an established practice, which in recent years has marked a revolution in dentistry, in particular, is the possibility given by the 3D printing technologies to realize with extreme precision ultra-realistic dental models. Based on our expertise in rapid prototyping and additive technologies we have created within our site an Area Medical and we are structured to make available to health care professionals our expertise in order to support them in the implementation of these new techniques and make advances in digital dentistry.
The starting of additive manufacturing, the CAD/CAM files, is generated due to optical scanning of the patient’s mouth, run on handheld devices or traditional machines; the result is usually a file .DICOM which is then converted into a .STL file ready to be printed.
Smartech looks at it as an epochal change in the industry and in the study dedicated to it published in May last year argues that the dental sector “will be the one that will change more radically from 3D printing in the next decade“, in fact, thanks to the speed of implementation and working precision machine dentistry will be greatly improved and “3D printing will reach more than 60% of the total production of the dental prosthesis, that percentage may be even higher” (http://www.ildentistamoderno.com/).
Many operators already successfully use this technology to build precise anatomical models of teeth and gums, dental prostheses such as crowns, inlays, bridges, posts, partial dentures and total surgical instruments and precision. It is a process that helps to minimize the amount of errors, allows the practitioner to finally make realistic tests on models similar to the mouth of the patient both in form and texture and also makes it more streamlined communication between patients and professionals to illustrate what will be the true operation.
