Detection of occlusal carious lesions

The purpose of this study was to determine the sensitivity and the specificity of detecting the presence and extent of occlusal carious lesions using traditional examination techniques performed by three experienced restorative dentists and a laser fluorescence-measuring device (DIAGNOdent) on 100 extracted third maxillary and mandibular molars. The extracted teeth were selected to ensure presence of questionable occlusal caries and intact occlusal surfaces. The results revealed that the DIAGNOdent demonstrated a higher sensitivity (94%) compared to the clinicians' consensus (82%) but a lower specificity. This study also indicated that higher values of the DIAGNOdent do not appear to correlate well with the depth of the carious lesion in the dentin (r = 0.3809) as measured by a caries-detecting dye.