Bite Force Evaluation of Conventional Plating System Versus Locking Plating System for Mandibular Fracture

Abstract

Aims and Objectives To compare and evaluate the variation in recorded bite forces in patients with mandibular fractures undergoing open reduction and rigid internal fixation using standard 2.0 versus 2.0 mm locking miniplates. Materials and Methods A prospective randomized study was conducted for the treatment of mandibular fractures. Twenty adult patients with 31 mandibular fractures requiring an open reduction and internal fixation were included in the study. The sample was divided into two groups depending upon whether the patients received 2.0 mm non-locking (standard) or 2.0 mm locking miniplates for rigid fixation respectively. Bite force was evaluated at 1st, 3rd and 6th week after the open reduction and rigid fixation using miniplates. Results A statistically significant difference was not found in the clinical parameters such as pain, swelling, infection, paresthesia, hardware failure, and mobility between the fracture segments. The results showed that amongst locking vs non-locking miniplates, the former showed a greater bite force enhancement when compared to baseline values(post-trauma).A comparison between 2nd day post-operative vs 6th week post-operative values showed a significant increase in bite force in Group 1 (nonlocking) (p \ 0.05) whereas the values Were highly significant (p \ 0.001) in Group 2 (locking Plate). Conclusion The findings were suggestive that the efficacy of locking miniplates plate in mandibular fracture was superior in terms of bearing the masticatory loads during osteosynthesis of the fracture. However, the clinical results were almost similar to those seen with non-locking miniplate osteosynthesis.

Comparison of Bite Force with Locking Plates versus Non-Locking Plates in the Treatment of Mandibular Fractures: A Meta-Analysis

“…Four articles met the inclusion criteria for this study. 4 14 15 16 Two of these articles presented identical results; 14 16 therefore, the most recent article was excluded from the meta-analysis. 16 Another study included in this review expressed the results in graphs, so it was not included in the meta-analysis due to the impossibility of extracting raw data such as mean and standard deviation.…”

“…The reference lists of the selected papers and a hand search revealed one additional relevant paper. A total of 4 studies involving 130 patients 4 14 15 16 evaluated bite force and were included in the qualitative synthesis ( Fig. 1 ).…”

“…1 ). One study was mentioned in two separate papers 14 16 that reported the same statistical data. These two articles were thus considered a single paper for the meta-analysis.…”

“… 15 The author was contacted by e-mail, but we could not obtain an answer. Therefore, only two studies 4 14 were included in the meta-analyses.…”

“…The results were analyzed in the follow-ups at 1, 3, 6, and 12 weeks, observing the mean of the bite force measurements in the incisor, left molar, and right molar regions ( Table 2 ). 4 14 15 16 …”