Unilateral Palatally displaced canines may not delay tooth formation: Study

Palatally displaced canines (PDC) can be associated with significant resorption of adjacent teeth. Furthermore, the treatment of canines, when they become impacted often involves surgical exposure of the tooth and the need for subsequent forced orthodontic eruption Delayed tooth eruption is often seen in patients with palatally displaced canines (PDC), but there is controversy over whether tooth formation is also delayed. This study attempts to elucidate the answer by addressing methodological shortcomings in previous studies.

Dental age estimation (DAE) is the most accurate method of estimating age where a formal birth record is absent. Accurate DAE relies on a reference data set comprising dental panoramic tomographs (DPT) that provide images of all the tooth morphology types. For each tooth development stage (TDS) summary data are the count (n-tds), the mean (-tds), and standard deviation (sd-tds). These data enable Normal distribution and Percentile summary data for each TDS. The DA for a single individual is calculated by taking the average of the TDS on the subject's DPT. This is the surrogate for chronological age.