Surgical template for completely edentulous patients

Implant angulation is of utmost importance for fabrication of esthetic, hyg ienic, and functional prostheses, even in the treatment of completely edent ulous patients. Most mandibular surgical templates are not reliable because of a lack of stability resulting either from severe resorption of the mand ible or from the interference of mucoperiosteal flaps elevated during surge ry. This article describes a technique for fabrication and surgical applica tion of a stable template for the completely edentulous mandible. By combin ing the mandibular template with a maxillary duplicate denture, the problem of lack of stability can be overcome. A consistently reliable reference fo r implant placement in the edentulous mandible, specifically in relation to implant angulation (trajectory), can be obtained.