Comparación de diversos métodos de estimación de edad dental aplicados por residentes de Postgrado de Odontopediatría

Abstract

Dental age estimation for pediatric patients who will receive dental treatment is of upmost importance because this allows the determination of their maturation level. Aim: To determine the precision in the estimation of the dental age through the use of the Nolla, Demirjian and Willems methods applied by pediatric dentistry residents in a group of Venezuelan children from the Capital District. Materials and methods: 71 high quality panoramic radiographs from healthy children ages 4 to 11 years old were selected and stratified by age and gender. Dental age was estimated using the Nolla, Demirjian and Willems´s methods. Each radiograph was randomly assigned and evaluated by at least two observers. Results: The highest correlation between chronologic and dental age was found for the Demirjian and Willems methods. The difference between dental and chronologic age was significant for Nolla (-0.30 years; p=0.001) and Demirjian (0.272 years; p<0.001), but not significant for Willems (0.02 years; p=0.74). All methods presented differences in dental age estimation being the Nolla method the most sensible to assessor’s performance. Conclusion: The estimation of dental age in pediatric patients can be made by trained observers. Dental age will always depend on the variability of each patient, the applicability of the estimation method for a given population and the degree of experience of the assessor.