[Principles and paradigms of augmented reality in oral implant surgery]

Augmented reality (AR) technology has the potential to fundamentally address the hand-eye coordination challenges inherent in dental navigation systems, and further, to revolutionize the way surgeons perceive and process clinical information during surgical procedures. However, current AR applications remain largely confined to simple interactions with imaging data, with little evidence of domain-specific hardware or generalized AR paradigms. More importantly, there is still a lack of discussion on how surgeons cognitively interpret AR-based virtual information. This gap has hindered efforts to design AR applications that are aligned with surgical cognitive processes, thereby limiting the full clinical value of AR in oral implant surgery. This paper reviews recent developments in AR across relevant disciplines, attempts to classify the underlying logic of AR interaction, and drawing on our team's research and development over the past several years, proposes a technical paradigm for AR applications with the potential for large-scale clinical adoption. The paradigm is based on a 'spatially anchored virtual indicators' that binds purely virtual guidance cues directly to the surgical field, enabling an intuitive, low-cognitive-load, and clinically scalable form of intraoperative navigation beyond conventional model-based AR approaches.