On 5th July 2012 a revolution occurred in Nottingham.
Shakeel Shadad, ITI fellow and Consultant in Restorative Dentistry from the Royal London, presented to a small group of implant practitioners.
I had booked Shakeel to present this as I had seen a sneak preview of this presentation earlier in the year and it is mind-blowing and counter intuitive stuff.
I have used Straumann dental implants since 1998 and achieved fantastic results with a tissue level implant series (which Shakeel likes to call collarless implants and I’m sure he is right) all through this I encountered people saying “you can’t use these in the aesthetic zone” “you can’t use these at the front of the mouth, the silver collars will show and you’ll have problems”. I always disagreed with this but felt I was in the minority and kept my mouth shut.
Shakeel presented both clinical cases and long-term research showing how and why tissue level implants are, infact, the treatment of choice in the anterior region and not in any way an inferior option.
Over time this movement will grow as more and more of us explain to us that they importance of the position of the implant and the potential detriment of removal and replacement of a healing cap are too crucial in implant dentistry to ignore. The use of a well-placed tissue level implant, regaining height and grafting properly at the front of the mouth provides the best aesthetic outcome in implant dentistry with long-term predictable results.
I expect, if any ‘bone level users’ from other systems read this, they will comment and tell me that I am insane but I will just direct them to Shakeel and tell them to go and see one of his presentations on this subject.
A truly amazing CPD experience.
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