Introduction

In order to give adequate support to organisations who plan to (or already do) use FDM Rapid Manufacturing models for making medical implantable parts, it was decided to provide a document which can be used as a best practice guide. The objective of this document is to give an overview, written by experts in the field, to give their opinion and appreciation of developments from a user point of view.

Since there are various documents available on the Custom IMD Extended Services website (http://www.customimd.eu/CustomIMDES/) which extensively describe relevant technical details (e.g. manufacture, material and part handling, sterilisation procedures), this report will give a complementary overview of elements and issues that are not mentioned elsewhere.

The report starts with a technical overview of the experimental manufacturing method of FDM employed by Custom IMD partners as a basis. In addition to this, the report also describes some case studies from FDM medical parts. By doing so, one can learn and be inspired to follow a suggested route for manufacturing a particular part which resembles your own part the most.

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