Are your dental implants actually as clean as promised?’

A look at assessing the quality of implants.

Complications which occur after dental implant placement are often attributed to the patient’s oral hygiene, or the dentist’s lack of education and/or experience. However, the professors and practitioners at the CleanImplant Foundation believe that contaminated dental implants could be the cause of peri-implantitis in more cases than many would expect.

The CleanImplant Foundation was established in Germany by Dirk Duddeck, dentist and biologist, who explains more about the organisation, its aims and the importance of truly clean dental implants, “At the CleanImplant Foundation we conduct a quality assessment of approx. 100 sterile-packaged dental implants from different brands every two to three years. Over the years we have analysed a total of more than 300 different dental implant types from 200 companies using the Scanning Electron Microscope. The astounding result: approximately one-third of all tested implant samples are contaminated with significant residue from the manufacturing process or contaminants attributable to the packaging process. The dental implant surface debris most frequently evidenced were different carbonaceous compounds identified, e.g. synthetic polymers, thermoplastic materials, Perfluoropolyether (PFPE) – all of them are known to exhibit toxic effects. Significant residues of Dodecylbenzene-sulfonic acid (DBSA) were also found on surfaces of sterile-packaged dental implants. Remnants of this aggressive and surface-active cleaning chemical are cell-toxic and classified as ‘hazardous’ according to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).