Platform Switching of Dental Implants: A Beneficial Approach

A new study published in the Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry suggests that platform switching of dental implants is a beneficial approach for retaining crestal bone around dental implants.

Platform switching, which uses narrower abutments than the implant platform, has been used to reduce marginal bone loss (MBL) surrounding dental implants. While platform switching has been reported to prevent initial peri-implant bone loss, available data regarding the use of the platform-switching implant abutment configuration with long-term follow-up has been sparse. Thus, a systematic review was planned to evaluate the best available evidence for the use of the platform switching technique.

Purpose of the Systematic Review

The purpose of this systematic review was to answer the specific question, "Is there a difference between platform-matching implant abutment configurations and platform-switching implant abutment configurations in terms of MBL changes around endosseous implants"?

The PubMed/Medline, Scopus, Google Scholar, and Lilac databases were searched by 2 independent reviewers for articles published between January 2000 and July 2022. Platform-switched versus platform-matched implants were examined for changes in MBL in human randomized clinical trials (RCTs) and potential clinically controlled cohort studies (PCCS).

Results

Overall, 4 eligible studies were included and critically evaluated to summarize their findings. The follow-up period of the included studies was between 5 and 10 years. Two of the included studies showed a mean ± standard deviation of 0.6 ± 0.20 mm MBL at 5 years and 1.20 ± 0.21 mm at 10 years for the platform switched (PS) technique and 1.1 ± 0.3 mm and 1.24 ± 0.39 mm MBL for the platform matched (PM) technique. Another study showed marginal bone level changes for the platform-switched technique to be 0.18 ± 0.14 mm as compared with the platform matched technique (0.80 ± 0.40 mm). In one of the studies published in 2019, the mean estimated difference in the marginal bone levels of PS- and PM-restored implants after 5 years was reported to be 0.29 mm. The descriptive analysis of 4 RCTs indicated that platform-switched implant-to-abutment connections reduced average marginal bone loss surrounding implants compared with platform-matched implant-to-abutment connections, favoring the platform-switched approach.

Platform switching appears to be a beneficial approach for retaining the crestal bone around dental implants.

Reference

Marginal bone loss around implants with platform switching and platform matched connection: A systematic review. Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry. Sidhartha Tomar, Deepesh Saxena, Navpreet Kaur. Published: October 20, 2023. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.prosdent.2023.09.009

Keywords

• Platform
• Switching
• Dental implants
• Beneficial
• Approach
• Retaining crestal bone
• Around
• Dental implants
• Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry