Dental age with four radiographic methods in subjects with cleft lip and palate: a study of cases and controls
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Published on: November 4, 2025
N Carrillo-Mendigaño1, K Molina-Diaz2, L Ramos-Rivera2
1Oral Health Department, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá, Colombia. ncarrillom@unal.edu.co.
Objectives:
The aim of the present study was to establish the relationship between dental age (DA) and chronological age (CA) in children with and without a non-syndromic cleft lip and palate (NSCLP) and to determine differences in the dental development of teeth adjacent to the cleft.
Study Design:
Cases and controls.
Methods:
A study of cases (146) and controls (171) matched by sex and age (aged between 6 and 12 years) was carried out. Cases were defined as individuals with NSCLP. Dental age was determined from panoramic radiographs using four methods: Willems, Demirjian, Haavikko and Nolla.
Statistics:
A paired t test supplemented with Mann-Whitney test was performed to compare the means of the previously established dental ages.
Results:
For the control group, three of the four methods used showed a significant overestimation of DA when compared to CA; only Haavikko's method showed agreement between DA and CA. For the case group, it was found that the Haavikko's method presented a lower DA to CA in all phenotypes of individuals with NSCLP, while with Nolla's method, no statistical differences were found for any of the case groups and Demirjian method overestimated the DA for all the cleft phenotypes.
Conclusions:
In individuals with NSCLP, the Haavikko method (which showed no differences with chronological age in controls) shows a decrease in dental age, suggesting a delay in dental development in this population. The maxillary left lateral incisor was the tooth with the greatest development delay in subjects with unilateral NSCLP.