Currently the surgical training of parietal bone
graft techniques is performed on patients or specimens.
Commercially available bone models do not deliver
realistic haptic feedback. Thus customized parietal
skull surrogates were developed for surgical training purposes.
Two human parietal bones were used as reference.
Based on the measurement of insertion forces of drilling,
milling and saw procedures suitable material compositions
for molding cortical and cancellous calvarial layers
were found. Artificial skull caps were manufactured and
tested. Additionally microtomograpy images of human
and artificial parietal bones were performed to analyze
outer table and diploe thicknesses. Significant differences
between human and artificial skulls were not detected
with the mechanical procedures tested. Highly significant
differences were found for the diploe thickness values. In
conclusion, an artificial bone has been created, mimicking
the properties of human parietal bone thus being suitable
for tabula externa graft lift training.