Dentistry – Apparatus – Work support
Patent
1994-01-28
1996-07-09
O'Connor, Cary E.
Dentistry
Apparatus
Work support
433 63, A61C 1100
Patent
active
055338968
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention concerns an articulating device with automatic adaptation to the registered condyle distance.
It is already well known that an articulator is a subsidy for odontotechnicians, as it simulates the cranio-facial skeleton limited to the upper jaw, to the mandible and to the temple-mandible articulations.
The bone structure of the articulations consists of two fix elements, one for each side, inserted at the basis of the cranium, shown as glenoid cavities, and of two movable elements, the condyles, united one to the other by means of the mandible body.
The condyles get placed at the center of the relative glenoid cavities when the mouth is in an occlusion position, i.e. in the position of maximum intercuspidation.
When the mandible moves, the condyles inside the glenoid cavities move in synchrony; these movements are complex and tridimensional.
In the articulator, the upper branch shows the jaw, and the lower branch looks like a mandible, while the articulations have been transformed into mechanisms placed in part on the upper branch, in part on the lower branch.
The articulators may be divided in two kinds: those that have the condylar part in the lower branch and the glenoid part in the upper branch and are called ARCON, i.e. articulating condyles, and those non-ARCON, that have the condyles in the upper branch and in the lower branch are provided with a system that simulates the glenoid cavity.
The articulator may be personalized by adapting the mechanism that simulates the articulations to determined movements that the condyles perform in the glenoid cavity.
Those movements, that are called condylar distances and shown like the edge or limit within which the functional movements of the mandible are performed, may be realized by means of extra-oral or intra-oral registrations.
The extra-oral registrations make use of a pantograph system that is placed onto the face and is blocked onto the mandible and the jaw, and by means of printers, lay-outs are obtained that are transferred onto adaptable articulators that are compatible with this kind of registration.
For what concerns the intra-oral registrations, waxes are used that are indented by the mandible when the latter gets from a central position to a lateral-projecting one. Wax indentations will be performed first on one side and then on the other side. The distance that must be covered by the condyle from the central to the lateral-projecting position is transferred onto adaptable articulators in the mechanism simulating the articulations.
After having obtained the chalk casting (models) of the two arches, the use process may be described as follows: branch of the articulator by means of an appropriate instrument (transfer facial arch); be incuspidated to the lower one that will be plastered to the lower branch; that covers part of the palate and of the occlusion surface limited to the molar and premolar teeth; this base will be realized in double copy; the occlusion surface of the bases; the softened wax registers the lateral-projecting indenting; lateral-projecting positions of the mandible will be registered, e.g., first from right to left and then from left to right.
Now the intra-oral registration considers only two positions of the condyles inside the glenoid cavity: condyles are placed at the center of the glenoid cavity; the side of the lateral projection, the condyle is placed forewardly on the bottom and inside moves of about 1.00 cm, while on the other side, it is placed upward and backward of 0.1 to 0.2 cm.
From the ideal union between the two condylar positions--the central one and the lateral-projecting one--the condylar distance is obtained.
As the distance covered by the condyle in its lateral-projecting movement takes place in three dimensions, the mechanical system that simulates the glenoid cavity rotates simultaneously around the transversal axis realizing an inclination from top to bottom and from back to front, together with an inclination that rotates around the vertical axis with an
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patent: 4189837 (1980-02-01), Stele
patent: 4443191 (1984-04-01), Guitierrez
patent: 5020993 (1991-06-01), Levandoski
patent: 5073109 (1991-12-01), Hadary
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