Abstract

PALMA, Adriana Benquerer Oliveira; CASTRO, Carolina de; IMPARATO, José Carlos Pettorossi  and  MENDES, Fausto Medeiros. Photographic method for diagnosis of carious lesions on a smooth surface. RGO, Rev. gaúch. odontol. (Online) [online]. 2011, vol.59, n.3, pp. 397-403. ISSN 1981-8637.

Objectives To propose a photographic index to assess white stain carious lesions on smooth surfaces, to appraise and analyse the reliability of this index, and to establish a correlation between this index and DIAGNOdent and a visual index. Methods A total of 109 proximal surfaces of 63 deciduous molars kept in water was assessed. Two examiners received previous training on the indices. The visual index used was proposed by Nyvad et al. (1999). The photographic index consisted of standard photographs of each site taken after 5s, 60s and 105s of exposure of the tooth to the air. The examiners rated the three images per the following scale: 0 = whole, 1 = non evident opacity; and 2 = evident white stain. The DIAGNOdent was used after 3s and 20s of drying. The reproducibility between examiners for the photographic index was calculated, as well as the Spearman correlation between the photographic index and the visual index, and the DIAGNOdent scores. Results The Kappa scores for reproducibility were 0.808 for the visual examination and 0.907 for the photographic examination. The Spearman coefficient correlation (Rs) between the two indices was 0.629 (p < 0.0001). Between the photographic indices and the DIAGNOdent (3s) an Rs=0.440 (p<0.0001) was recorded. For the association between the photographic indices and DIAGNOdent at 20s, an Rs = 0.469 (p< 0.0001) was observed. Conclusion The conclusion was that the performance of the photographic method was satisfactory to detect carious lesions in deciduous teeth. The method has good correlation to other methods of diagnosis.

Keywords : Dental caries.; Photography.; Fluorescence..