Prevalence of Type of Attachment and Morphological Variations of Median Maxillary Labial Frenum Among Children

Introduction: Aberrant maxillary frenal attachment pose a problem of midline diastema and gingival recession. In children, they also cause difficulty in maintaining oral hygiene, accumulation of plaque which ultimately results in dental caries. Thus, a study was conducted with the objective of determining the prevalence of frenum in children. Method: A total of 369 children from Kanti Children's Hospital (KCH) visiting the dental department were recruited in the study. The frenum was examined and classified by Placek's classification and Sewerin's classification. Chi-square test was used for showing association between frenum with age and gender. Result: The most prevalent frenum type on the basis of type of attachment was gingival (51.2%), followed by the mucosal type (43.6%), papillary penetrating type (2.7%), and papillary type (2.5%). According to the morphological type, the most common frenum was found to be simple frenum (81%), simple frenum with appendix (7.9%), frenum with nodule (6.5%), persistent tectolabial (2.2%), simple with nichum (1.6%), and bifid labial frenum (0.8%). Conclusion: The most common frenum was gingival frenum and simple frenum in children. Morphological frenum variants were associated with gender. The attachment of frenum fibres showed association with age. As the age progressed, the frenum was observed to migrate apically.