Presurgical radiographic assessment for implants.

A radiographic technique was developed to accurately assess bone available for the placement of intraosseous implants. Hypocycloidal tomographs were made at right angles to the long axis of the mandibular and/or maxillary alveolus while the patient was wearing a specially designed splint. Alveolar height and width measurements were obtained from the resulting films. Sensitivity results for this technique showed that the mean difference between the actual bone height and width and that measured in the radiographs was 0.49 mm and 0.35 mm, respectively. A paired difference test revealed a range of 0.25 mm to 0.73 mm in the expected error in the height and 0.20 mm to 0.50 mm in width measurements with a 95 confidence interval.