Professor Kunio Ishikawa of the Graduate School of Dentistry, Kyushu University, and Tomohiro Kumagai, director of the Institute for Development Management, GC Corporation, have developed the world's first artificial bone with the same composition as the inorganic component of bone, and received regulatory approval.
Until now, as a bone reconstruction technique for recovering bone lost due to illness or accident, transplantation of the patient's own bone has been given top priority in terms of safety and therapeutic effect.However, since autologous bone grafting imposes a heavy burden on patients, the development of highly functional artificial bones has been desired in recent years.
This time, the group first confirmed that the inorganic component of bone is carbonate apatite by component analysis.Furthermore, we have found for the first time in the world a method for completely artificially synthesizing carbonate apatite by converting the composition by a dissolution-precipitation reaction in an aqueous phosphate solution using calcium carbonate as a precursor.As a result of this achievement, we succeeded in producing an artificial bone with the same composition as the inorganic component of bone for the first time in the world, and on December 2017, 12, it was approved as the first artificial bone in Japan that can be used for dental implants.In addition, clinical trials were conducted at Tokushima University Hospital, Tokyo Medical and Dental University Dental Hospital, and Kyushu University Hospital to demonstrate the efficacy and safety of carbonated apatite granules as a medical device.
The study is expected to reduce the burden on patients in dental implant treatment and expand the number of indications.