Dental practice using rapid prototypes for surgery

Andrew Dawood is director and co-founder of Dawood & Tanner and its research and consultancy arm Cavendish Imaging which performs charitable surgery for the organisations Saving Faces and Facing the World. 

‘It’s very niche, there’s very little of it going on,’ Dawood said. ’We feel like we are slowly changing the way some types of surgery are done.’

The practice specialises in dental implants, which in their simplest form are titanium fixtures inserted into the jaw which can be used to replace one or more missing tooth roots. However, some of the patients not only have multiple missing teeth but also damaged jaw bone due to accidents or disease.

For these challenging patients Dawood uses magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or computed tomography (CT) scans to get a precise 3D schematic which can then be fed directly into rapid prototyping machines to get models and certain temporary prosthetics.

‘We can plan things out on models,’ said Dawood. ’For example, we can make drilling guides and cutting guides to enable us to put the implants in exactly the right place.