Dental implant treatment, performed upon loss of a natural tooth and by implanting an artificial tooth root (implant body) in the jawbone at the location of tooth loss and using the artificial tooth root as a base to mount an artificial tooth thereon, has been conventionally known.
With the dental implant treatment that is currently being practiced, after surgically excising the gums above the jawbone (alveolar bone), an implant body of a size determined beforehand by examination is implanted in the jawbone and thereafter, there is a necessary waiting period of of three months to six months for integration (osseointegration) of the implant body and the jawbone. Treatment is then performed through the procedures of mounting a pedestal, referred to as an “abutment body,” on the implant body that has integrated with the jawbone and mounting an artificial tooth that has been molded to a predetermined size in advance on the abutment body.
The dental implant treatment is performed in accordance with these procedures and therefore six months to one year are generally required as a treatment period.
Also, depending on the patient, the bone amount (especially the bone thickness) required for implanting the implant body may be insufficient, especially in the case of performing treatment on the maxilla. In this case, first, an auxiliary operation, such as a guided bone regeneration method (GBR method), ridge expansion, socket lifting, sinus lifting, etc., is performed on the jawbone and the dental implant treatment is performed upon forming the necessary bone amount, thus requiring an additional treatment period of several months.
Conventionally-known dental implant treatments, such as those mentioned above, require a long treatment period and therefore had the problems that, for a patient, the treatment methods cannot be said to be available to everyone due to the high time and economic burdens and, even if treatment can be received, the mental and physical burdens were high due to inconvenience being imposed over a long period.
In view of such problems of the conventional dental implant treatments, the present applicant proposed the following art in a prior application (Japanese Patent Application No. 2014-109085).
As shown in FIG. 11 and FIG. 12, the prior proposed art is a dental implant system 101 with an arrangement where at least two implant bodies 102, each having a shaft portion 121, form a pair, a hook portion 122, hooked in a hook hole 161 bored in a jawbone 106, is provided on the shaft portion 121 of each implant body 102, the hook portion 122 is bent with respect to the shaft portion 121, and when the respective implant bodies 102 are hooked onto the jawbone 106, tip portions 122c of the hook portions 122 are positioned so as to face each other inwardly, the arrangement being provided with a fixing means for fixing the implant bodies 102 to each other.
With the invention according to the prior application by the present applicant, by simply hooking the implant bodies 102 onto the jawbone 106 and using an abutment body 103 and a fixing member 104 to integrally integrate the respective implant bodies 102, the integrally integrated implant bodies 102 are fixed to the jawbone 106, and therefore a period for integration of the implant bodies and the jawbone is not required as in the conventional implant treatment, and the treatment period and the number of times of treatment can be reduced. Treatment of a patient whose jawbone is small in bone amount or thickness is also enabled and elongation of the treatment period due to an auxiliary operation can also be avoided. That is, the dental implant system according to the prior application differs fundamentally from the conventional implant treatment in which the implant bodies are fused to the jawbone, and enables firm fixing to be achieved by a mode of clamping the jawbone by two implant bodies while reducing the treatment period and the number of times of treatment of many patients regardless of the bone amount of the jawbone, etc., and minimizing the impact to the jawbone to lighten the mental and physical burdens of the patients.
As mentioned above, with the dental implant system 101 according to the prior application, the at least two hook holes 161, bored in the jawbone 106 at the location to be treated, must be bored at a predetermined interval and in directions of facing each other inwardly (at a predetermined angle).
However, there is a problem that using a conventionally used dental drill, it is extremely difficult to bore two or more holes (hook holes) at a predetermined angle and interval in a minute space in which a single tooth grows, and reliability of treatment cannot be secured.
The following arts have been proposed as arts used in dental treatment to bore a hole at a precise position.
The art described in Patent Document 1 (Japan Patent Pre-Publication No. H11-318940) is an art relating to:
“A parallel cutting aiding tool for dentistry arranged from a mounting portion (1), equipped with one of either a shaft or bearing that is a member constituting a first coupling joint (A) for rotatingly actuating a shaft when the shaft is mounted adjacent an external front surface (outer side of dental arch) or rear surface (inner side of dental arch) of a substantially central portion of a groove (1a) of a shape having a depth and width that are in accordance with a predetermined location of a dental arch, and an arm portion constituted of a first arm (2), equipped at one end with a bearing or shaft that is a remaining member constituting the first coupling joint (A) and equipped at another end with one of either a shaft or bearing that is a member constituting a second coupling joint (B) having a rotational axis parallel to an axis of the first coupling joint (A) and being for rotatingly actuating a shaft when the shaft is mounted, and a second arm (3), equipped at one end with a bearing or shaft that is a remaining member constituting the second coupling joint (B) and equipped at another end with a hand piece mounting portion (5) for detachably attaching a hand piece, and being arranged so that when a hand piece (6) is mounted on the hand piece mounting portion (5), an angle (θ) formed by a rotational center line of a cutting tool (6a) mounted on the hand piece (6) and the axis of the first coupling joint (A) is set to a desired angle (symbols are those in Patent Document 1).”
The art described in Patent Document 2 (Japan Patent Pre-Publication No. 2011-183157) is an art relating to:
“A positioning aiding apparatus for boring a plurality of dental implant holes, the apparatus including a main arm unit including an arm body having a first end and a second end disposed to face each other and having a reference shaft pivoting above the first end, a first connecting head pivoting at the second end of the main arm unit via a connecting shaft and pivoting in all sequences, and an extension arm unit having a pair of connecting rods, a second connecting head, a drill guide portion disposed above an outer end portion of the second connecting head, the drill guide portion having a drill guide hole.
However, although these arts enable a hole having a predetermined angle to be bored at a position of predetermined distance or interval with respect to a certain location within an oral cavity as a reference, as the interval between the reference part and the location at which the hole is bored, for example, only an interval such as that from a back tooth at the left side to a back tooth at the right side is presumed, and there is a problem that boring of two or more holes at a predetermined angle and interval in a minute space in which a single tooth grows as in the art according to the prior application by the present applicant is not enabled.
Dental drills and positioning aiding apparatuses for dentistry that have already been proposed thus cannot be applied to the art according to the prior application by the present applicant.
Patent Document 1: Japan Patent Pre-Publication No. H11-318940
Patent Document 2: Japan Patent Pre-Publication No. 2011-183157