Use of magnetic abutments for short endosseous implants following a fibula bone graft in an oral cancer patient: a case report.

Dental implant treatment is an indispensable portion of oral rehabilitation in patients who are to undergo reconstructive surgery following the removal of an oral cancerous lesion. However, ideal dental implant treatment cannot be achieved easily in patients who have undergone mandibular reconstruction with a free vascularized flap, usually because of the limited length, height, and width of the bone graft. Shorter implants (< 10 mm in length) therefore are occasionally used in vascularized fibula graft sites. In such cases, however, shorter implants tend to be overloaded, thereby endangering its longevity. In this article, we discuss how a magnetic abutment system was introduced for such a patient. This was designed to discourage overloading of the mandatory short implants. The outcome was successful without overloading 1.5 years after the placing of the mandibular overdenture.