Effect of post-osseointegration loading magnitude on the dynamics of peri-implant bone: a finite element analysis and in vivo study.

Purpose: Much research has been invested in determining the effects of postoperative loading of implants and whether this loading contributes to implant failure, but the issue remains controversial. The present study aimed to elucidate whether cyclic lateral loading of an implant causes bone resorption or bone formation at various loading magnitudes, using a finite element method (FEM) and peri-implant morphologic and morphometric analyses.

Methods: An FEM model was created using Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) data of rabbit tibia.

A comparison of the peri-implant bone stress generated by the preload with screw tightening between 'bonded' and 'contact' model.

A number of finite element analyses (FEAs) for the dental implant were performed without regard for preload and with all interfaces 'fixed-bonded'. The purpose of this study was comparing the stress distributions between the conventional FEA model with all contacting interfaces 'fixed-bonded' (bonded model) and the model with the interfaces of the components in 'contact' with friction simulated as a preloaded implant (contact model). We further verified the accuracy of the result of the FEA using model experiment.