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Matthias A. König [1] and Oliver P. Gautschi [2] and Hans-Peter Simmen [1] and Luis Filgueira [3] and Dieter Cadosch [4]

Academic Editor: Rosalind Labow

1, Department of Traumatology, University Hospital Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland, usz.ch

2, Département de Neurosciences Cliniques, Geneva University Hospital, Geneva, Switzerland, hug-ge.ch

3, School of Anatomy and Human Biology, University of Western Australia, Perth, WA, Australia, uwa.edu.au

4, Department of General and Trauma Surgery, Triemlispital, Zurich, Switzerland, stadt-zuerich.ch

Received Feb 9, 2017; Revised May 9, 2017; Accepted Jun 19, 2017

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

1. Introduction

Metal-based implants have become essential and very successful treatment tools in dental and orthopedic trauma surgery. Implant failure rates are usually well below 5% for the first two years. The rates may increase up to 10–20% under local inflammatory conditions, including periodontitis and allergic reactions against the metal implant [1]. To date, surgical revision is the gold standard in treating implant failure. With an increasingly ageing population, implant failure with the consequent need of revision surgery will have a clinical and economic significance in the future.

Aseptic loosening (AL) is the leading cause of failure of total joint arthroplasty [2]. Aside from the well investigated and recognized role of wear debris (in the nanometer range) in the initiation and development of AL, over the last years, there has been increasing evidence that involvement of metal ions released by biocorrosion might influence AL by enhancing osteolysis and decreasing osseointegration [3, 4].

Various metal alloys used in metal implants contain vanadium (V), which gives the alloy favorable physicochemical and mechanical properties. Several in vitro and in vivo studies have investigated the bioactivity of V and different V compounds. It has been demonstrated that V compounds have an insulin and growth factor mimicking action [5, 6]. In addition, V compounds largely influence phosphatases, a group of enzymes mainly associated with the cell membrane [7]. Phosphatases, specifically the tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase (TRAP), play a paramount role in osteoclastic activities. Inhibiting TRAP might reduce the risk of AL. In vivo studies carried out to investigate the biodistribution of V compounds showed that V...

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