Introduction: Space maintainers are appliances used in maintaining space and guiding unerupted permanent successor into the arch in the proper position. With today's technological advances, attempts have been made to implement new materials in manufacturing.
Objectives: To study the clinical effectiveness and the patient's comfort of CAD/CAM PEEK space maintainer and compare it to the conventional band and loop space maintainer.
Materials and methods: A Two parallel arms randomized controlled clinical trial where 20 children with an age range 5-7 years indicated for space maintainer were selected and were randomly allocated into 2 groups: Experimental group (CAD/CAM PEEK space maintainer), Control group (Metal Band & Loop space maintainer). Patients were recalled at the 1, 3, and 6 months for clinical follow-up. The patient's comfort was assessed after insertion of the space maintainers.
Results: Evaluation was evaluated at 1,3 and 6 months. Fisher's Exact test, and Mann-Whitney U test were used to compare groups. The significance level was set at a P value of 0.05. There weren't any statistically significant differences between the two groups regarding the clinical effectiveness, plaque deposition and gingival health. (P=1.00), (P=0.052) respectively. Only one case failed of the study group. There was a statistical significance difference regarding the patient's comfort (P=0.001). The experimental group had greater patient's comfort than the control group.
Conclusions: The CAD/CAM PEEK space maintainer showed a high clinical success rates with a greater patient's comfort during the 6-month follow-up period in comparison to the band and loop space maintainer.