Validation of the digital photographic assessment to diagnose traumatic dental injuries.

Introduction: Alternatives for monitoring dental trauma in epidemiological surveys may be useful, as data collection of epidemiological investigation can be jeopardized due to several conditions.

Aim: To investigate the validity of standard digital photographs to determine the occurrence of anterior dental trauma compared to the clinical examination in an epidemiological survey.

Methods: Participants were children aged 8-12 years old attending both private and public schools; children were clinically evaluated for the assessment of dental trauma, and standard photographs were taken from maxillary and mandibular permanent incisors of each child. Validity was determined by calculating the percentages and respective 95% confidence interval of sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value. Cohen's kappa statistic was also used.

Results: A total of 412 children were included, totaling 3296 teeth assessed for dental trauma presence. The prevalence of dental trauma was 11.2% (95% CI 8.29-14.61) and 10.2% (95% CI 7.45-13.53), respectively, for the clinical examination and the photographic method. Agreement between the gold standard and the photographic diagnosis was good: 0.64 for the prevalence of dental trauma and 0.66 for diagnosis of dental trauma on a tooth basis. The diagnosis through the photographic method had higher specificity (96.7%) than sensitivity (65.2%). High positive likelihood ratio and low negative likelihood ratio were also observed.

Conclusion: The photographic assessment method of dental trauma was valid and reliable as compared to the oral clinical examination.