ABSTRACT

Introduction:Precise volumetric measurement of newly formed bone after maxillary sinus floor augmentation (MSFA) can help clinicians in planning for dental implants. This study aimed to introduce a novel modular framework to facilitate volumetric calculations based on manually drawn segmentations of user-defined areas of interest on cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) images

Material & Methods: Two interconnected networks for manual segmentation of a defined volume of interest and dental implant volume calculation, respectively, were used in parallel. The volume data of dental implant manufacturers were used for reference. The efficacy of this framework was demonstrated through practical applications for collecting CBCT data from patients after MSFA with the same quantity of two different bovine-derived bone substitutes: xenohybrid composite bone (GroupI,n=10) and hydroxyapatite (GroupII,n=10). The study was approved by the central Ethical Review Board of the federal state of Lower Austria (approval number: GS4-EK-4/451−2021). The volumes were measured immediately (T1) and 6months (T2) after MSFA and before insertion of the dental implant. All measurements were analyzed for inter- and intra-variability. P-values of >0.05 were obtained from the t-test analysis

Results: The manual delineation of GroupII (n=10) was easier than that of GroupI (n=10) due to the visual contrast of the CBCT scan. The mean volume was 861.65 ± 290.02 mm³ at T1 and 875.9 ± 288.96 mm³ at T2. This shows a moderate dispersion around the mean value, which indicates variability of the analyzed data

Discussion: The proposed network may be useful for the development of computer-based diagnostic systems for assessing the success of MSFA with bone replacement materials. The volumetric stability achieved with the two bone replacement materials were comparable.