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Personalization and Precision: Innovative Applications and Future Challenges of Additive Manufacturing in Orthopedic
Puzhen Wu1, Xinrui Liu2, Ziyu Guo3
1Population Health Sciences, Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, New York, USA.
Summary
Additive manufacturing (AM) offers patient-specific orthopedic implants, surpassing traditional methods in precision and customization for skeletal repair. This technology enhances recovery and implant longevity, paving the way for personalized orthopedic care.
Area of Science:
- Orthopedic Surgery
- Biomedical Engineering
- Materials Science
Background:
- Orthopedic implants restore function in severe bone defects beyond self-repair capacity.
- Conventional manufacturing limits precision, customization, and complexity in implant design.
Purpose of the Study:
- To review additive manufacturing (AM) principles and applications in orthopedic implant design.
- To highlight AM's advantages over traditional methods for patient-specific implants.
Main Methods:
- Explanation of AM principles and workflow from design to fabrication.
- Comparison of major AM modalities (powder bed fusion, material extrusion, directed energy deposition, stereolithography).
- Survey of clinical deployments and research advances.
Main Results:
- AM enables highly accurate, customized orthopedic implants tailored to patient anatomy.
- AM surpasses conventional machining in design freedom and personalization.
- AM positively impacts postoperative recovery, implant longevity, and patient comfort.
Conclusions:
- Additive manufacturing is a transformative technology for personalized orthopedic implants.
- Further interdisciplinary collaboration is needed to scale AM for broader clinical use.
- AM offers significant potential to advance orthopedic care through patient-specific solutions.
