With populations aging around the world, the need for complete dentures is likely to increase in Brazil and other developing countries, as well among low-income populations globally, making the teaching of cost-efficient techniques to dental students essential. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of complete dentures fabricated by the simplified method in comparison to the conventional method regarding patients' oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) and satisfaction, dentures' functional quality, and masticatory performance of patients who were rehabilitated by dental students. From February 2016 to April 2017, final-year dental students at the Federal University of Alfenas, Brazil, were instructed to fabricate new complete dentures for 36 edentulous patients, who were randomly divided into two groups according to denture manufacturing method: simplified method or conventional method. Patients' OHRQoL and satisfaction and the prostheses quality were evaluated at one, three, and six months. Masticatory performance was evaluated at three months. The results showed there was no significant difference between the two methods regarding OHRQoL, patient satisfaction, prostheses quality, or masticatory performance (p>0.05). All aspects evaluated also remained constant for the same group (simplified method or conventional method) in all periods of evaluation (p>0.05). The study concluded that the simplified method for complete denture fabrication was able to produce protheses with functional quality and patient satisfaction comparable to those produced with the conventional method, even when made by dental students.
Keywords: complete dentures; dental education; educational methodology; prosthodontics.