Age assessment in the living using modified Gustafson's criteria in a northern Chinese population.

Regressive dental changes appear to be suitable for age assessment in living adults. In 2012, Olze et al. showed that several criteria presented by Gustafson for extracted teeth can also be applied to orthopantomograms. The objective of this study was to test the applicability and reliability of this method in a Chinese population. For this purpose, 1300 orthopantomograms of 650 female and 650 male Chinese aged between 15 and 40 years were evaluated. The characteristics of secondary dentin formation, periodontal recession, attrition, and cementum apposition were reviewed in all the mandibular premolars. The sample was split into a training and test dataset. Based on the training set, the correlation of the individual characteristics with chronological age was studied with a stepwise multiple regression analysis, in which individual characteristics formed the independent variable. According to the results, the R values amounted to 0.80 to 0.83; the standard error of estimate was 4.29 to 4.75 years. By analyzing the test dataset, the accuracy of the present study, Olze's and Timme's formulas were determined by the difference between the estimated dental age (DA) and chronological age (CA). Taking both mean differences and mean absolute differences into account, the Chinese age estimation formula did not always perform better compared with Olze's and Timme's formulas for both males and females. It was concluded that this method can be used in Chinese individuals for age assessment. However, the applicability of the method is limited by the quality of the X-ray images, and the method should only be applied by experienced forensic odontologists.

Prevalence of dental erosion in young adults aged 18 years in Poland.

AIM: The aim of this study was to assess the prevalence of tooth wear in young adults in Poland. METHODS: A total of 1,886 persons aged 18 years, selected on a basis of multistage sampling, were examined within the Nationwide Dental Health Monitoring Programme. Previously calibrated dentists measured tooth wear using the BEWE-scoring system (Basic Erosive Wear Examination). RESULTS: Out of 1,886 young adults, 42.2% presented the signs of dental erosion. Considered the severity of erosion, it was graded as 1, 2 and 3 in 28.9%, 11.9% and 1.5% of 18-year-olds, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Results of clinical assessment of dental erosion in 18-year-old young adults revealed that erosive tooth wear is an important problem in this age group. Of them, 13.4% had signs of advanced tooth wear which may lead to serious clinical problems in the future.

The problem with an epidemiological index for dental erosion.

This article reviews and discusses the difficulties posed by the application of epidemiological indices for the measurement of dental erosion. It covers several aspects of index design.

Reliability of an occlusal and nonocclusal tooth wear grading system: clinical use versus dental cast assessment.

The reliability of a newly developed tooth wear grading system was assessed both clinically and on dental casts by two observers using 20 participants. The reliability of clinical occlusal/incisal tooth wear grading was fair-to-good to excellent, while that of most of the clinical nonocclusal/nonincisal grades was at least fair-to-good. Dental cast assessment frequently yielded poor reliabilities, especially for nonocclusal/nonincisal surfaces. Hence, occlusal/incisal wear could be graded more reliably than nonocclusal/nonincisal wear, while the clinical assessment of tooth wear was more reliable than the grading of dental casts.