THE EVALUATION OF DIFFERENT FORMS OF MARGINAL MANDIBULECTOMIES IN TERMS OF POSTOPERATIVE FRACTURE RISK

Aim: the purpose of this study is to reveal an optimum marginal mandibulectomy design to prevent postoperative fractures. so then, two different common designs were compared with finite element analysis. material and methods: two types of marginal mandibulectomies (angular and curviliniear) were performed on the posterior corpus of a 3 dimensional mathematical mandible model which was created from the tomography images. stresses which took place on those two models under bite forces, were evaluated with finite element analysis. results: the models were evaluated and compared in terms of; minimum and maximum principal stresses, von mises stress and displacement magnitude. the highest stresses occured in the postero-inferior corners of the defects on both of the models. similarly, the highest displacement magnitudes were measured in the posterior corners of both models. higher stresses and displacement magnitudes were measured in all sites of the angular model compared to curvilinear one. conclusion: we conclude that, both of the models' postero-inferior corners were more prone to be fractured and the angular model had more postoperative fracture risk in comparison with the curvilinear one.