Resumo

PRADO, Renata F et al. Societal perceptions of dentofacial appearances of patients with malocclusion: a systematic review. Arq. Odontol. [online]. 2015, vol.51, n.2, pp. 61-66. ISSN 1516-0939.

Aim: This systematic review aimed to evaluate whether or not there is evidence enough to support the hypothesis that society promotes judgments on the facial aesthetics of individuals with malocclusion. Methods: Searches were conducted in the PubMed, Bireme, BBO, LILACS, Web of Science, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, and SciELO databases, supplemented by an additional manual search. Results: The present study included all articles that appeared in each of these databases between January 1965 and February 2015. Inclusion criteria were based on the articles whose primary focus was the societal perception of dentofacial appearances, written in English; observational and experimental epidemiological studies (Cross-sectional, Longitudinal, Cohort, Randomized Clinical Trial, Case-Control); and systematic reviews. Review articles, clinical case reports, laboratorial experiment studies, and abstracts were excluded. This search identified 2,530 articles, of which four fulfilled the inclusion criteria. Of these, only one study showed a high level of scientific evidence. The main flaws found included blind assessment of the measurement, validity of the measurement methods, error analysis of the method, and confounding factors not reported in all articles. Conclusion: According to this systematic review, it could be concluded that there is a need for further studies with more efficient methodological qualities.

Palavras-chave : Orthodontics; Malocclusion; Visual perception; Systematic review.