3D Printing in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery

Oral and maxillofacial surgery (OMS) has been a strong user of 3D printing-enabled technologies for three decades. The wide scope of applications spans from more routine, shorter dentoalveolar procedures all the way to large, complex ablative reconstructive surgery of the head and neck. Anatomic modeling, patient-specific implants and virtual planning and templating are all established use cases in OMS, with some of them now considered standard of care. The combination of needing reconstructive surgery to be functional with the need to keep harmony in the facial aesthetic is one reason these surgeries benefit from surgical planning, patient-matched templates, and personalized implants. This chapter explores the connection between medical imaging, surgical planning, and 3D printing to illustrate the power of surgical personalization for patients who require oral and maxillofacial surgery.