Potential application of the dental aesthetic index to prioritize the orthodontic service needs in a publicly funded...

Resources for publicly funded dental programs may never be sufficient to accommodate unlimited orthodontic service demands. There is therefore an obligation to ensure that they are preferentially provided to those patients most likely to derive the greatest benefits. To address this strategic concern, the pretreatment records of 38 patients were prioritized on a visual-analog scale relative to their differential orthodontic service needs by 16 independent orthodontic specialists. Unfortunately, inconsistencies in these assessments were unacceptable for a publicly funded program. When these same records were prioritized relative to their scores derived from the Dental Aesthetic Index, their assessments proved more consistent, especially when based on a modified Dental Aesthetic Index. The relevance of such Dental Aesthetic Index scores proved controversial, because the need for orthodontic services is dependent on other factors in addition to esthetics. The lack of established clinical guidelines to delineate the most appropriate service and timing for specific occlusal discrepancies further hampers the prioritization of orthodontic service needs. Dental Aesthetic Index case-scores may therefore be considered as just 1 of many criteria to prioritize orthodontic service needs, although the potential impact of the others has yet to be quantified.