While much of the focus for 3D printing in the medical industry has been around implants and medical devices used by patients, one of the largest areas of application has concentrated on anatomical replicas. Historically, clinical training, education, and device testing have relied on the use of animal models, human cadavers, and mannequins for hands-on experience in a clinical simulation. These options have several deficiencies including limited supply, expense of handling and storage, the lack of pathology within the models, inconsistencies with human anatomy, and the inability to accurately represent tissue characteristics of living humans.
 
Physicians are now using models produced by AM from patient scan data to improve the diagnosis of illnesses, elucidate treatment decisions, plan, and, in some cases, even practice selected surgical interventions in advance of the actual treatments. The models help physicians understand patient anatomy that is difficult to visualize, especially when using minimally invasive techniques. Models also assist in accurately sizing medical devices. Physicians can also use the models to explain an upcoming surgery to patients and their families and to communicate the surgical steps to the clinical team.

To help reduce cost some facilities have developed procedures where surgeons practice and plan operations on low cost mannequins that are transplanted with with patient-specific AM models. This coupled with the fact that AM technologies are able to produce both hard and soft materials in a single part, allowing the accurate replication of human tissue, calcification, and bone, means that surgeons can now obtain an even better understanding of exactly how a procedure needs to be performed right down to the touch and feel of the different parts of a patient’s anatomy.
 
Creating tissues and organoids