Volker Kuhna, Nikola Ivanovica, Wolfgang Recheisb

a Department of Trauma Surgery, Austria

b Department of Radiology, Medical University Innsbruck, Innsbruck, Austria

 

Objective: Modern high-end 3D-printers enable resolutions up to 16μm.

 

Purpose of the presented study was firstly, to investigate the quality and difference of microCT-based trabecular bone structures, and secondly, the biomechanical properties of such 3D-printed trabecular bone samples.

 

Methods: Micro-CT scans of human trabecular samples with different bone quality were performed with a vivaCT40 (Scanco/CH) and analyzed according to the standard settings. Based on these data, typical STL-files were created for 3D-printing purpose for the use with a high-end 3D-printer. The washing-out procedure of the necessary supporting material was optimized with appropriate chemical solutions. In the next step, original bone structures were compared with the 3D-printed copies from micro-CT data by image registration.

 

Results: The selected procedure enables high conformity between original and high resolution 3D-printed trabecular bone structures. The conformity is affected by image and printing resolution, thresholding and filtering parameters.

 

Conclusion: After further optimization of the selected 3D-printinting materials, it is possible to achieve appropriate E-module values of different trabecular bone qualities. Such artificial created bone samples may be helpful for future standardized biomechanical testing of newly developed osteosynthesis screws and implants for osteoporotic fractures.

 

Full text is available at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214031X14001569