Dental age assessment (DAA): a study of a Caucasian population at the 13 year threshold

The purpose of this study was to develop a Reference Data Set for Dental Age Assessment at the 13 year old threshold in Caucasian children.

Patients, Materials and Methods

The Reference Data Set comprised 5187 re-used Dental Panoramic Tomographs (DPTs) between the ages of 11-15 years, from both the Eastman Dental Hospital and King’s College Dental Hospital archives. Tooth Development Stages were recorded for the left maxillary and mandibular teeth and all four permanent third molars (Demirjian et al., 1973, Demirjian 1978). A separate Study Sample of DPTs, comprising 50 males and 50 females aged between 10 and 16 years was collected to test the accuracy of the method. Summary Data was generated for the individual Tooth Development Stages which consisted of the number (n-tds), mean (x), standard deviation (sd) and the standard error (se). By using the mathematical techniques of meta-analysis, this data was used to estimate the age of each subject in the Study Sample. The estimated Dental Age derived was compared to the gold standard of Chronological Age.

Results

The mean difference between the Chronological Age and Dental Age was determined to be −0.1 years (−1.2 months) for males and 0.05 years (−0.6 months) for females.

Conclusion

Dental Age was reliably estimated at the 13 year threshold.