PATIENT SATISFACTION AND CHEWING ABILITY WITH IMPLANT-RETAINED MANDIBULAR OVERDENTURES - A COMPARISON WITH NEW COMPLETE DENTURES WITH OR WITHOUT PREPROSTHETIC SURGERY

Purpose: The objective of this study was to compare denture satisfacti on and chewing ability of edentulous patients treated with dental impl ant-retained overdentures or with full dentures with or without previo us preprosthetic surgery. Patients and Methods: This study was a contr olled clinical trial. Thirty-eight men and 52 women participated in th e study. The mean height of the anterior mandible was 21 mm (range, 16 to 25 mm), measured on a lateral cephalometric radiograph. The subjec ts were randomly assigned to the three treatment modalities. The main outcome measures were denture satisfaction and chewing ability, which were assessed using questionnaires focusing on denture-related complai nts and the ability to chew different types of food, and an overall de nture satisfaction score. Results: Based on the baseline data from the ''denture complaints'' and ''chewing ability'' questionnaires, nine i nterpretable factors could be extracted. Two factors did not vary foll owing treatment and were excluded from the outcome analysis. At the 1- year evaluation five of seven factors showed significantly better scor es for the two surgical groups than for the control group. The same wa s found for the overall denture satisfaction rate. Conclusion: Overden tures retained by dental implants or complete dentures made after a ve stibuloplasty and deepening of the floor of the mouth provide a more s atisfactory solution for denture-related problems than complete dentur es alone. For the scale ''functional complaints lower denture,'' the o verdenture group showed even a significantly better score than the pre prosthetic surgery group.