Dental surgery guide system

A dental surgery guide system for use with a surgical handpiece for a surgical intervention, the dental surgery guide system comprising:

• a surgical template adapted to be secured within the patient's mouth, the surgical template comprising:
• an opening that coincides with a surgical axis, to allow passage of a surgical instrument for access to a surgical site;
• one or more template guide rails, each template guide rail having its longitudinal axis aligned parallel to and offset from the surgical axis;
• and
• a template stop, the template stop being fixed relative to the template;
• a handpiece jig adapted to be secured to the surgical handpiece, said handpiece jig comprising:
• one or more handpiece guides, each handpiece guide being engageable with a respective template guide rail, and
• a handpiece stop, the handpiece stop being fixed relative to the handpiece guide(s);
• the handpiece guide(s) and the template guide rail(s) cooperating to restrain the lateral position and the axial orientation of the surgical instrument relative to the surgical template during the surgical intervention and permitting relative sliding movement therebetween along the surgical axis towards the surgical site during the surgical intervention;
• and
• wherein the template stop and the handpiece stop are adapted to cooperate to limit the depth to which the surgical instrument can advance along the surgical axis during the surgical intervention, the handpiece stop moving with the handpiece guide(s) towards the surgical site along an axis parallel to the surgical axis during said relative sliding movement to advance the surgical handpiece along the surgical axis towards the surgical site during the surgical intervention, and
• the handpiece stop engaging with the template stop at a predetermined position during said relative movement during the surgical intervention to prevent further advancement of the surgical instrument towards the surgical site, and
• wherein each handpiece guide has a proximal end and a distal end whereby, during the surgical intervention, the proximal end of the handpiece guide is in closer proximity to the handpiece along the surgical axis than the distal end of the handpiece guide;
• wherein each template guide rail has a proximal end and a distal end whereby, during the surgical intervention, the proximal end of the template guide is in closer proximity to the handpiece along the surgical axis than the distal end of the guide rail;
• and
• wherein, during the surgical intervention, the entire proximal end of the handpiece guide can slide below the proximal end of the template guide rail.