Unveiling the Impact of Surface Treatments: A Prospective Analysis of Clinical and Radiographic Outcomes in Dental Implant Patients

Implant dentistry is a widely utilized treatment approach for fully or partially edentulous patients. To enhance the success rates of dental implants, various surface modifications have been developed. This study aimed to compare clinical and radiographic parameters in patients with sandblasted acid-etched versus anodized surface dental implants. In this prospective clinical study, 78 patients who had undergone implant placement for missing single posterior tooth in mandible using sandblasted acid-etched and anodized surface dental implants during August 2019-December 2019 were enrolled according to strict inclusion and exclusion criteria and were categorized into Group 1: SLA (n = 27), Group 2: SLActive (n = 26), Group 3: TiUnite (n = 25) based on the surface modification of the implants. Peri-implant probing depth (PPD) and crestal bone loss (CBL) measurements were carried out at 3 months and 1-year intervals. For intergroup comparison, one-way ANOVA and Tukey's HSD post hoc test were used. For intragroup comparison, paired t test was used. PPD and CBL in Group 3 implants was significantly higher than Groups 1 and 2 (P ≤ 0.05). On pairwise comparison, there was a statistically significant difference in PPD and CBL between the groups at baseline (P ≤ 0.05) and 1-year follow-up (P ≤ 0.05) except for Group 1 vs. Group 2 at 1-year follow-up (P > 0.05). Intragroup comparison of PPD and CBL showed that there was a statistically significant difference from baseline in all the three groups in terms of PPD (P ≤ 0.05) and CBL (P ≤ 0.05). Patients with anodized dental implants exhibited greater PPD and CBL compared with those with sandblasted acid-etched implants.