A study of oral stereognostic proficiency in dentulous and edentulous persons

Stereognosis means the ability of a person to recognize the shape and surface characters of an object using tactile sensations, without looking at them. The purpose of this study was to determine and compare the oral stereognostic levels of different age groups having full complement of teeth, for edentulous patients with and without prosthesis and also for denture satisfaction. In this study, oral stereognosis was tested with the aid of small metallic pellets referred as test forms, which had surface alterations as well as alterations in basic shape. The seven test forms were cube forms of 5mm x 5mm x 5mm & plaster replicas of these forms were five times larger which served as visual aid to the patient during tests. To start, each subject was given sufficient time to get acquainted with general shapes and surface characters of test form by visual inspection of plaster replicas. One of the metallic test form was randomly selected & placed on the subject's tongue and asked to indicate the identification by pointing at the appropriate plaster replica. In this study, inverse relationship was found between stereognostic level and age of the subject. The stereognostic scores of dentulous subjects were higher than edentulous. There were no significant differences in edentulous persons with or without denture. Stereognostic score was low in most satisfied denture wearers and was high in dissatisfied denture wearers.