A retrospective study of dental implants in diabetic patients

Aim of the study

The aim of this retrospective study was to evaluate the success of implant treatments in diabetic patients, whilst accepting the greater occurrence and severity of periodontal diseases in these patients.

Materials and methods

215 Brånemark and ITI implants (131 maxillary and 84 mandibular) were placed at two clinical centres, in 40 diabetic patients (6 type-1 and 34 type-2) whose blood sugar levels were stable at the time of implantation. The implants were followed up for a period of 6.5 years.

Results

Thirty-one of the 215 implants failed, which corresponds to a success rate of 85.6 %. Amongst the failures, 24 survived the first year after being brought into function. No failure was recorded during the period of osseointegration. There was no correlation with the sex or age of the patient, the type of prosthesis, smoking, blood sugar, the length or the site of the implants. The global survival rate was 85.7 % after 6.5 years in function.

Conclusion

The success rates of dental implants in stable diabetic patients is lower than those of the general population but is still of a reasonable level. The failures could be connected with overloading of the reduced bone-implant contact surface, due to an alteration of bone metabolism linked to abnormalities of collagen in response to glycosylation products.

Commentaries

This retrospective study aims to quantify the risk factor of diabetes, even when controlled, in implant treatments. We see that the risk of failure increases by approximately 10 %, compared with the general population but after the implants have been brought into function for one year, failures become extremely rare.