Howard Speaks Howard Farran, DDS, MBA, MAGD, Publisher, DentalTown Magazine

Have you noticed the information about the implant market lately? According to research conducted by Nobel Biocare the implant market is growing at 12-15% per year. In 1987, 30% of all general dentists restored dental implants but by 1999 that number jumped to over 78% (total number of US general dentists is 120,000). Last year, general dentists restored over 600,000 implants. Approximately 24,000 general dentists restored 480,000 implants and the other 98,000 dentists restored 120,000 implants. This means that 8 out of 10 dentists restore less than two implants per year. If your only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. If you held up a Hermann Rorschach inkblot to a roomful of general dentists, 80% would see a 3-unit bridge, and 20% would see an implant and crown.

Take another look at the market for dental implants. According to the recent report by the surgeon general–Oral Health in America, more than 7% of Americans at age 17 are missing at least one permanent tooth. By age 50, this number climbs to 12.1 teeth; including 3rd molars and one third of all Americans over the age of 65 are completely edentulous. Statistics from the National Institute for Dental Research (NIDR) show 100-115 million people are missing teeth and the number just continues to grow with 40-45 million teeth extracted annually.

Even though the percentage of fully edentulous patients is declining by 10% each decade, this is more than offset by the growth in the aging baby-boomer population. This is the “Fully Edentulous Paradox”? You should read, Will there be a need for complete dentures in the United States in 2020? by Douglass CW, Shih A, Ostry L, Harvard School of Dental Medicine, Boston MA J Prosth Dent 2002;87:5-8. In real numbers, people with one or both fully edentulous arches will actually increase from 33.6 million people to 37.9 million people by 2020. That is an increase in over 4 million denture patients!

He was dead before I graduated, but Dr. Lindsey D. Pankey (Pankey Institute, Boca Raton, FL) said you can’t sell a product if it’s not sitting on the shelf. About ten years ago at a seminar, I heard Dr. Gordon Christensen, ask a room full of general dentists, “How many of you pull wisdom teeth?” and about half of the hands went up. He then asked, “How many of you place dental implants?” and only a couple of hands went up. Gordon responded by saying that placing a root form dental implant was easier than extracting a wisdom tooth and that every dentist who currently pulls wisdom teeth should be surgically placing root form implants. I couldn’t believe it! How could that be true? I never placed a single implant in dental school and quite frankly figured it must be a very difficult procedure. After my first implant course, I started taking every implant course I could find. By 1998 I had earned my Diplomat in the International College of Oral Implantology and my Fellowship in the Misch Institute.

If you routinely diagnose 3-unit bridges and partials before thinking about dental implants then I want you to vow today to learn whatever skills are necessary to advance your C&B to what Heliane Canepa of Nobel Biocare now calls C&B&I. Heliane calls it C&B&I, an acronym for Crown & Bridge & Implants, because she is convinced dentists around the world are about to become as comfortable with restoring dental implants as they currently are with standard crown and bridge procedures. In fact, if you want to learn more about placing and restoring dental implants, and you like Las Vegas, then you should mark your calendar for April 2-5 for the “2003 World Conference” at the Rio All-Suites Casino Resort. For more information go to www.nobelbiocare.com/ or call 800-579-6515. Or visit BioHorizons at www.biohorizons.com for details on its symposium in March.

If you are interested in learning more about dental implants right now, then log onto our website at www.DentalTown.com. DentalTown still remains the largest and fastest growing online dental community in dentistry with 15,000+ registered dentists, endodontists, oral surgeons and other specialists. Go to the implant forum and you can learn about dental implants to your heart’s content. Townie Mark Collins, DDS, a.k.a. Desert Rat, loves the Bicon Implant system. He says, “I started doing implants last August and it adds about $100,000 in production for me. Not bad for about a $10,000 investment. They sell themselves and you don’t deal with insurance. My training was at the Bicon Institute.” More information about Bicon is available at www.bicon.com.

Another Townie, Jerome Smith, DDS says, “If you’re serious about “getting into dental implant surgery”, please consider doing something other than a manufacturer’s course. There is much more to implant dentistry than meets the eye or that can be presented in a manufacturer’s course.” If you really want to learn techniques that will be the best for your patients and your practice, please consider the programs at the following: Misch Institute (www.misch.com); the Medical College of Georgia (www.mcg.edu) or the Midwest Dental Implant Institute.

A profound knowledge of anatomy, bone character, medical screening, implant occlusion considerations, bone grafting, soft tissue considerations and sedation are absolutely necessary if you’re going to do a proper job and keep yourself out of trouble. Visit Jerome Smith’s website at www.jeromesmithdds.com for great information.

Deciding which dental implant system could be a lengthy debate! Deciding whether or not to surgically place dental implants could be an even longer debate! Deciding to get into restoring dental implants is not a debate!