| Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of digital workflow by evaluating the absolute technical differences in various scanning methods on jaw models with scanning bodies.;Material and Methods: Twenty identical 3-dimensionally printed mandibular quadrant jaw models with a single implant and scanning body replacing a missing tooth in area #19 were examined. Cone beam computed tomography .STL files were used as the first test group. Intraoral scans were used as the second test group. Desktop scans of each model and the .STL file was used as a control. The .STL files were then superimposed onto each other using imaging software. Absolute differences were measured by manually selecting the same seven points in each model, and a best fit model was generated using 20,000 points of measurement. The average distance and standard deviation for each superimposition was generated by the software, and statistic evaluation was then conducted.;Results: The results revealed a statistically significant difference between both test groups and the control. A mean difference of .10 mm with a standard deviation of .044 for the CBCT scanned image files, and .05 mm with a standard deviation of .011 for the IOS scanned image files. Under the clinical significant value of .5 mm, both groups were significantly less than 0.5mm with p < 0.05. Interclass correlation showed excellent reliability of overall superimposition (ICC = 0.84, p < 0.05).;Conclusion: The results show that the CBCT and IOS test group scanned files were statistically significantly different from the control desktop scans. Clinically, the differences may not be detectable. |
