Abstract
Loss of the entire midface leaves few options available for support of the dentition. Total loss of the maxilla bilaterally means that none of the traditional support areas are even partially useful. Surgical reconstruction of the midface is aggressive, and yet problems of support and retention for a dental prosthesis, as well as the facial prosthesis, remain. Osseointegrated implants can provide support and retention utilizing the remaining bones, but the distribution of occlusal forces becomes a concern, given their unfavourable location relative to the opposing dentition. Considerable attention has been given to framework design for intraoral implant-supported prostheses (1) but designs for extraoral framework typically have not been engineered with a view to controlling forces on the individual implants. This work describes the design procedure of such an extraoral framework which was fabricated for an individual. To minimize the possibility of unintentional overloads, consideration of the forces on each of the implants was prominent in design planning.
