Customer Complaints as an Evaluation Tool Assessing the Performance and Clinical Suitability of Different Implant Design

Abstract

During an assessment of dental implant design effectiveness, most of the data are acquired from clinical or animal studies performed by researchers and clinicians. In order to represent scientific significance, those studies have to be properly designed, focusing on a precisely chosen aspect with inclusion and exclusion criteria. The last of these, especially, can create major limitations for the data collection. In order to create a reliable, complete overview of different implant suitability, the data from a single customer can also be a valuable input in dental science. The aim of the study was to compare if the type of implants returned corresponded with sales figures for this type of implant or if there were any differences in the number of complaints. Customer complaints regarding dental implants produced by the same manufacturer acquired from dental professionals from different countries were evaluated over a fixed period of time. After having compared the number of complaints regarding implants to the number of sold implants, it was evident that single-piece implants and those with a polished surface used for immediate loading were significantly less likely to generate customer complaints than conventional two-stage systems (p < 0.001) with rough surfaces and larger endosseous diameters.