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Artificial Intelligence Model to Detect Real Contact Relationship between Mandibular Third Molars and Inferior
Tianer Zhu1, Daqian Chen2, Fuli Wu2
1Stomatology Hospital, School of Stomatology, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Clinical Research Center for Oral Disease of Zhejiang Province, Key Laboratory of Oral Biomedical Research of Zhejiang Province, Cancer Center of Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310006, China.
Abstract:
This study aimed to develop a novel detection model for automatically assessing the real contact relationship between mandibular third molars (MM3s) and the inferior alveolar nerve (IAN) based on panoramic radiographs processed with deep learning networks, minimizing pseudo-contact interference and reducing the frequency of cone beam computed tomography (CBCT) use. A deep-learning network approach based on YOLOv4, named as MM3-IANnet, was applied to oral panoramic radiographs for the first time. The relationship between MM3s and the IAN in CBCT was considered the real contact relationship. Accuracy metrics were calculated to evaluate and compare the performance of the MM3-IANnet, dentists and a cooperative approach with dentists and the MM3-IANnet. Our results showed that in comparison with detection by dentists (AP = 76.45%) or the MM3-IANnet (AP = 83.02%), the cooperative dentist-MM3-IANnet approach yielded the highest average precision (AP = 88.06%). In conclusion, the MM3-IANnet detection model is an encouraging artificial intelligence approach that might assist dentists in detecting the real contact relationship between MM3s and IANs based on panoramic radiographs.
