# Chewing efficiency and patient-centered outcomes in maxillary rehabilitation with zygomatic vs. conventional implant-supported fixed restorations

## TL;DR

This study compares chewing efficiency and quality of life outcomes for two dental implant treatments in patients with upper jaw tooth loss.

## Contribution

The study provides new evidence that zygomatic implants offer similar chewing efficiency but better quality of life compared to conventional implants.

## Key findings

- Zygomatic and conventional implants showed comparable chewing efficiency based on subjective assessments and color mixing tests.
- Patients with zygomatic implants reported better psychological and physical well-being according to OHIP-14 scores.
- Implant success rates were high for both treatments, with 100% success at the implant level for zygomatic implants.

## Abstract

This study aimed to assess whether zygomatic implant-supported fixed restorations (ZIFRs) provide comparable chewing efficiency and patient-centered outcomes to conventional implant-supported fixed restorations (CIFRs) in edentulous maxilla cases.

A total of 29 patients were enrolled in this study. These patients with maxillary edentulism received ZIFR (16) or CIFR (13) treatment between October 2018 and April 2022. Chewing efficiency was evaluated by the subjective assessments of the scales of chewed gums and the variance of the Hue in a two-color chewing gum mixing ability test. In addition, the Oral Health Impact Profile-14 (OHIP-14) was employed to compare the oral health-related quality of life of patients between these two groups.

There were no significant differences in chewing efficiency between the ZIFR and CIFR groups according to the results of the subjective assessments (P = 0.59 and P = 0.19 in the first and second stroke of the chewing test, respectively) and the variance of the Hue (P = 0.55 in the first stroke and P = 0.28 in the second stroke). Based on OHIP-14 results, the ZIFR group reported less psychological pain, physical disability, and psychological discomfort. In addition, the success rate of implants in the ZIFR and CIFR groups was 100% and 98.1% at the implant level and 100% and 93.75% at the patient level, respectively.

With the limitations of the study, the chewing efficiency of ZIFRs was comparable to CIFRs in the rehabilitation of maxillary edentulism. However, under such conditions, ZIFRs can offer better postoperative quality of life compared to CIFRs.