Fabrication of milled removable partial dentures using a custom plate with prefabricated artificial teeth.

PURPOSE

Although digital removable partial dentures have been previously described, there have been no reports on how to fabricate them in one piece. This study proposes a new method for fabricating patient-specific digital removable partial dentures using a custom plate.

METHODS

First, a gypsum model was scanned using a laboratory scanner and a removable partial denture was designed using computer-aided design (CAD) software based on standard tessellation language data. The metal clasp was fabricated from Ti-6Al-4V using a 3D printer. For custom plate fabrication, a resin plate frame was designed using computer-aided design (CAD) software and fabricated using a 3D printer. An artificial tooth and metal clasp were fixed on the base surface of the frame, an auto-polymerizing resin was poured into the frame for the denture base, and the artificial tooth and metal clasp were packed to form a custom plate. The plate was cut using a milling machine. Subsequently, the support attached to the denture was removed and polished for complete fabrication of the denture.

CONCLUSIONS

Our novel removable partial denture fabrication method is more efficient than the conventional method. The obtained removable partial dentures demonstrated satisfactory accuracy.