Hindawi Publishing Corporation Case Reports in Dentistry

Copyright © 2012 Carlo Fornaini et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The aim of this clinical study was to describe the possibility of using the Nd:YAG laser device utilized in the dental offices to weld metals intraorally. The authors, before applying this technique “in vivo ” on human subjects, tested the “in vitro ” metal welding efficacy of dental Nd:YAG device firstly by interferometry, SEM, and EDS and subsequently by thermal camera and thermocouples in order to record temperature changes during the welding process on bovine jaws. Four implants were inserted in the edentulous maxillary arch of a 67 years old male patient. Immediately after that, a bar previously made by the dental technician was intraorally welded to the abutments by Nd:YAG laser (Fidelis Plus III, Fotona, Slovenia) with these parameters: 9.90mJ, 1Hz, 15msec, 0.6mm spot. Then the prosthesis was connected to the bar with four OT Caps. This clinical study, even if preliminary, suggests that laser welding technique may be intraorally used without side effects. 1