A Spanish cancer patient is the first person in the world to receive a titanium 3D-printed sternum and rib cage, designed and manufactured by an Australian company.

The 54-year-old needed his sternum and a portion of his rib cage replaced.

The CSIRO said chest prosthetics were "notoriously tricky" to create due to the complex customised geometry and design for each patient.

Thoracic surgeons typically use flat and plate implants in the chest, but they can come loose over time and create complications, the CSIRO said.

A 3D-printed implant was a safer option for the patient because it can identically mimic the intricate structures of the sternum and ribs.

Almost a fortnight since the surgery, the CSIRO confirmed the patient was discharged and had recovered well.

Anatomics, the company who made the implant, used an electrum beam metal printer to create the part.

Alex Kingsbury, additive manufacturing research leader at the CSIRO, explained how the part was created.

"3D-printing works by imputing a 3D digital cad file into a computer and then that computer talks to the machine.

"The machine then puts down layer upon layer of material and each layer is fused.

"As each layer is fused you then start to build up a part as your layers increase."

The plate sits on the sternum and the limbs are screwed into the ribs. ( CSIRO: Anatomics )

The implant has a titanium plate that will sit over the sternum and the mimicked parts of the ribs are screwed into the bones of the rib cage, securing the implant with the bone.

"3D-printing was the most desirable method because the implant needed to be customised to the patient. No human body is the same," Ms Kingsbury said.

This is how the 3D-printed sternum and rib cage fit inside the patient's body. ( CSIRO: Anatomics )

The idea of 3D-printing prosthetics is considered the way of the future amongst medical professionals, and this surgery is not the first time the human body has been turned into a titanium masterpiece.

Earlier this year, in an Australian-first operation, surgeons successfully implanted a titanium 3D-printed prosthetic jaw.

It is expected that hospitals will eventually start using 3D-printing to replicate and replace broken bones and damaged tissue.

Research carried out at the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane is aiming to help surgeons print 3D models of areas of the body they are to operate on; and printing a "scaffold" that can be implanted as a replacement.

Dr Mia Woodruff, who leads the Biomaterials and Tissue Morphology Group at QUT's Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, has been spearheading research into the area for the past few years.

"Our hospital of the future, from out point of view, is going to have the patient go into hospital, you scan them and immediately next to that operating table you can print them that scaffold," Dr Woodruff said.

"If we have a company [that] would want us to build a million of these machines, it could be in every hospital within the next five years, easily. The technology is there."