Purpose: The aim of this in vitro study was to evaluate the temperature development of a novel, electropolished drill design during conventional and guided implant osteotomy in comparison to conventional drills under standardized conditions.

Materials and methods: Single and sequential 12-mm-deep drilling protocols (guided and unguided) with a conventional (control groups) and novel drill (test groups) were performed in artificial bone blocks under external irrigation. Each drilling protocol was repeated 30 times with drill diameters of 2.2, 2.8, 3.5, and 4.2 mm. Temperature changes were recorded by an infrared camera, and the accumulated thermal energy was calculated. For group comparison, a one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Tukey post hoc test were used with a level of significance set to = .05.

Results: The highest temperatures were measured up to 77.9°C for small-diameter drills in the control and test groups. The 3.5-mm and 4.2-mm novel drills showed significantly lower heat generation during guided and unguided osteotomy preparation for single and sequential drilling. The accumulated thermal energy during guided osteotomy preparation was significantly lower with the electropolished drills.

Conclusion: The drill design has an important impact on heat development during osteotomy, which was most pronounced for guided osteotomy with conventional drills and for small-diameter osteotomies.