Carmell Therapeutics

Dental Bone Graft Substitutes

Autologous bone grafts or bone graft substitutes are frequently required for bone augmentation as a part of patients’ overall dental implant restorations. Sufficient high-quality bone is required for implantation of dental implants to allow for osteointegration and strong mechanical support of the implant.

Autologous bone grafting has been the gold standard technique for tooth extraction socket preservation, alveolar ridge augmentation (needed for alveolar ridge atrophy), or for maxillary lift procedures to provide adequate bone volume and strength to support the eventual implant post osteointegration and subsequent full restoration. Autologous bone grafts are harvested as separate procedures to obtain sufficient bone and are associated with some morbidity. Alternatively, bone graft substitutes can be used, avoiding the morbidity of autologous bone harvesting. Examples are allogeneic cadaver bone and synthetic bone graft substitutes. This market has a high growth rate with significant unmet clinical needs. Whatever bone graft material is used, nearly all patients require multi-staged reconstruction with an initial bone augmentation procedure followed several months later by placement of the implant post.

Following the implant post implantation, patients must wait another several weeks to a few months to allow for secure osteointegration of the post prior to final tooth restoration. Biologic products are being used adjunctively to try to enhance and accelerate the initial bone augmentation phase as well as the osteointegration phase. Carmell’s BHA product is undergoing preclinical testing as an orthobiologic dental bone graft substitute, alone or in combination with synthetic materials. The intent is to accelerate and improve the quality of bone augmentation in dental implants surgery in order avoid the need for autologous bone harvesting and, potentially, to reduce the time needed to achieve definitive success.