Implant treatment in partially edentulous patients: a report on prostheses after 3 years.

There has been an increasing interest in the use of implants for partially edentulous patients. This introduces other biomechanical situations than those experienced in completely edentulous patients. In a prospective multicenter study, 521 implants in 154 patients were loaded with 197 free-standing prostheses. The patients have been followed for 3 years. The cumulative success rate for the prostheses was 94.8% and for the implants it was 93.9%. Most of the lost prostheses were only supported by two implants. A frequent technical complication was fracture and loosening of gold screws, which was more frequent in prostheses supported by only two implants.