A systematic review and meta-analysis of three-unit fixed dental prostheses: are the results of two abutment implants comparable to the results of two abutment teeth?

Summary

The purpose of the systematic review and meta-analysis was to compare the performance of three-unit bridges on teeth with three-unit bridges on implants, evaluating survival of the bridges, survival of the teeth or implants, condition of the hard and soft tissues surrounding the supports, complications and patient-reported outcome measures after a mean observation period of at least 1 year. A literature search was conducted using a combination of the search terms: fixed partial denture and fixed dental prostheses. An electronic search for data published until January 2017 was undertaken using the Medline, Embase and Cochrane Library databases. Eligibility criteria included clinical human studies, either randomized or not, interventional or observational, which evaluated the results of three-unit FDPs (fixed dental prostheses) on either two implants or two abutment teeth. The search identified 1686 unique references. After applying eligibility criteria 66 articles were included in the analysis. A total of 1973 three-unit FDPs were supported by teeth, and 765 were implant-supported. No significant differences were found either in the survival of the supporting abutments (P=0.52; 99% versus 98.7% survival per year) or in the survival of the prostheses (P=0.34; 96.4% versus 97.4% survival per year). Both treatments show an almost equally low complication rate, but there is a low level of reporting of hard and soft tissue conditions and patient-reported outcome measures. It is concluded that implant-supported three-unit FDPs seem to be a reliable treatment with survival rates not significantly different from the results of teeth-supported three-unit FDPs.

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