[A longitudinal study on growth and development of dental arches of primary, mixed and permanent dentitions]

In dental clinic for children, criteria for growth and developmental changes related to increases in the width and length of the dental arch at the primary, mixed, and permanent dentition stages are essential. This study was carried out to measure the width and the length of normal dental arch and to make detailed observations of growth and developmental processes in the dental arch at each dentition stage. Materials were serial study casts of the maxilla and the mandible taken every 2 month from 127 children (74 boys and 54 girls). The casts were made from 6 months after birth until the age of 15. Measurements of the width of the dental arch were made between bilateral teeth of the same tooth type, both deciduous and permanent. The length of the dental arch was measured on the basis of the perpendicular distance from the contact point of mesial surfaces of central incisors to a line between bilateral teeth of the same tooth type. Measured values were categorized according to either chronological age or tooth age on the basis of the eruption of the central permanent incisors. The indices of the dental arch with relation to the width and the length at each dentition stage were calculated for the sake of partial and total observations of alterations in dental arch form. The results were as follows: 1) In terms of chronological age, until 1 year before the eruption of permanent replacements, the width of the dental arch gradually decreased in both the maxilla and the mandible in the regions of the deciduous central and lateral incisors. Increasing slightly from about the age of 6 years and the period of mixed dentition, the width of the dental arch remained stable until the permanent dentition stage. From the primary dentition stage, the width of the dental arch in the region of the maxillary and mandibular canines and first and second molars gradually increased. Therefore it remained stable until the eruption of permanent dentition. The width in the region of the permanent maxillary and mandibular first molars gradually increased and attained a stable condition at about 12 years of age. In males, the width in the area of the maxillary secondary molars decreased slightly and tended to decrease in the mandible. In females, on the other hand, the width showed a tendency to increase with advancing ages. With the exception of the second permanent molars, the width between the distance of bilateral teeth were consistently larger in males than in females.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)