A CLINICAL EVALUATION OF FIXED DENTAL PROTHESES WITHOUT REGULAR MAINTENANCE

The purpose of the study was to evaluate the 5-year survival rate and the eventual reason of failure of fixed dental prostheses (FDPs) without long-term maintenance after intraoral insertion. 427 patients were subjected to our study. They did not receive any maintenance after the insertion of FDPs between 2005 and 2008. The patients were treated at the Prosthodontics Clinic, Dental School֞Grigore. T. Popa֞ University from Iasi, Romania. The subjects were contacted by letter or telephone to be asked for their participation. There were investigated parameters concerning oral hygiene status; abutment teeth; FDPs success / survival / complication and failure rate. The survival rate of the FDPs was 58% and the failure rate was 42% with a functional period of 5,4 years. The FDPs required retreatment at the time of examination, indicating 85% of the complication rate and 14,5% of the success rate. From the 3161 analyzed abutment teeth, 64 were extracted and from this resulted a 10% failure rate. The most common reasons for the complications were periodontal disease, loss of retention, endodontic treatments, decays, poor marginal adaptation and fracture of FPDs. The abutment teeth and fixed dental prostheses without clinical maintenance had many periodontal problems due to the dental plaque. The fatigue-mechanism could be advocated as the main factor for the failure of all-ceramic crowns