How additive manufacturing is driving healthcare innovation

Additive manufacturing benefits the healthcare industry by enabling the initial data from patient scans to be sent directly for processing and production.

However, this is not the only advantage of AM technology for healthcare. 

In the dental industry, crown and bridge frameworks are usually produced by casting or machining. Here, AM provides numerous advantages beyond the ability to make customised shapes, including the production of hundreds of frameworks simultaneously, reduced cost, faster manufacture and reduction in chair time for the patient. 

Additively manufactured dental crown and bridge frameworks also require less adjustment and offer improved materials content because they are free from toxic substances such as nickel, cadmium and beryllium, which are often included in frameworks produced by traditional manufacturing techniques. 

In addition, AM’s unique ability to incorporate porosity into products during the build process has resulted in standard and mass-customised AM implants becoming more commonplace. Hybrid, porous-solid implants can have a dramatic performance impact as the porous surface is used to integrate the device with the patient’s bone. 

The benefits of AM will certainly inspire companies to move from the traditional approach of mass-manufacturing bespoke products to one based on AM. However, the ability to produce customised products at scale is not the only benefit of AM technology. There is a whole package of advantages, such as fewer geometric constraints and streamlined workflows, that brings AM to the forefront of advances in manufacturing technology. We believe that a combination of data handling, product design, customisation, automation and AM will create the world-class products of the future. For this vision to be realised, manufacturers will require the know-how to perform post-processing on AM parts.