The analysis of compatibility of the output from different 3D printers in relation to the data obtained from different dental scanners

AIM: The purpose of this study is to investigate the compatibility of different scanner types and different printer types used in the dental sector. This study includes the examination of whether the new technological materials purchased for the clinic can be integrated with old ones and whether it is necessary to purchase the new technologies suggested by the manufacturers. Since the models obtained with 3D printers will replace the plaster models, it is important to investigate their statistical accuracy and whether these results are clinically meaningful. MATERIAL AND METHOD: Different .stl formats were obtained by scanning a single typodont model with 4 different dental scanners (iTero, Trios 3, PrimeScan, E1), 3 of which are intraoral and 1 of which is desktop scanner. Then, these .stl formats were sent to 4 different 3D printers (SLA, mSLA, DLP, FDM) and a total of 32 jaw models were obtained. Different measurements were made on the XYZ planes on the Typodont and printed models, and their compatibility was evaluated over the averages of these measurements. Measurements were made manually with a digital dental caliper. Intra-Class Correlation Coefficient (ICC) was used to examine the compatibility between the measurements. RESULTS: When measurements obtained from 4 different printers were compared with measurements obtained from typodont model, statistically significant differences were obtained in all planes (p<0,001). Comparing printers and typodont model in sagittal measurements, a perfect match was observed in all scanners. In the transversal plane, the combination of 3Shape Trios 3 and SLA showed the best compatibility. Statistically, the most different values in scanner-printer combinations were observed in vertical plane. CONCLUSION: This study showed that different 3D printers can produce clinically acceptable accuracy with different scanners. When comparing combinations of scanners and printers in XYZ planes, 3Shape Trios 3 and SLA showed the best match statistically compared to others. This harmony was followed by the combination of 3Shape Trios 3 and DLP. In clinical use, while all printers are well compatible with scanners, FDM has been found to be the last preferred printer among them.