Incidence of Dental Caries and Pericoronitis Associated with Impacted Mandibular Third Molar-A Radiographic Study

Background:

Impacted teeth are those which fail to erupt in dental arch within the expected time for a variety of reasons. Any tooth in the dental arch may become impacted but the most common are mandibular third molars followed by the mandibular premolars. Mandibular third molars erupt at 17 to 21 years age. The mandibular third molars when impacted may acquire a range of patterns and positions and can lead to diverse pathologies. One such pathology is pericoronitis and dental caries. Pericoronitis is an acute or chronic inflammatory condition presenting with pain, swelling, limited jaw opening and difficulty in swallowing.

Objective:

To assess the incidence of dental caries and pericoronitis associated with impacted mandibular third molars using radiographs and look for associations between the angulation of impaction pericoronitis and dental caries.

Materials and methods:

The study was conducted from the archived images exposed between September 2015 - April 2016. The images were from patients who have taken radiographs for impaction.The images were assessed in Planmeca Romexis viewer, Ver 5.0, Planmeca Oy, Finland in the native format. The image data was stored in Microsoft excel 2016, Redmond, WA, USA.

Results:

The study analyzed 273 radiographs from which 236 were picked up for analysis. 37 radiographs were excluded for poor diagnostic quality. For better analysis, the included subjects were classified into three groups of I (16-20 years), II (21-40 years) and III (41-60 years). The group II (21-40 years) showed higher incidence of pericoronitis and dental caries. Conclusion:

The study done by us on retrospective radiographs reveals that there is a higher incidence of pericoronitis across the age groups.