3D Printing Is Ready To Tackle Plastic Body Implants

Forbes March 31, 2022
Carolyn Schwaar

After an accident left a 40-year-old woman in Sweden with a massive head injury late last year, she received a 3D-printed implant made from a plastic called PEEK to repair her skull.

It was the first time a hospital had designed and 3D printed an implant of this kind on-site, and it could prove a turning point for 3D printing in medical care.

“As far as we know, we are the world’s first to make 3D implants entirely in a hospital, which means that the implants will be better adapted to the patients, right from the start,” says Einar Heiberg Brandt, medical engineer in Clinical Physiology at Skåne University Hospital, Sweden. “This will lead to faster surgeries and fewer complications.”

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