title: Radiographic tips on predicting inferior alveolar nerve exposure.
abstract: METHODS
  The study included 230 patients (60% female) with a total of 423 wisdom tooth extractions. The patients were treated by 2 oral surgeons between July 1998 and July 2002 in the Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery Unit of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts.
  The authors reported that the extraction was inspected for evidence of inferior alveolar nerve (IAN) exposure under direct vision using a headlight.
  
  
  METHODS
  Each tooth was inspected for the presence of any of the following 5 radiographic signs:
  
  
  RESULTS
  No IAN exposures occurred when all 5 radiographic signs were absent. Based on this study, where 189 M3 had such a radiographic presentation, we can conclude that the upper limit of the 95% confidence interval for the IAN exposure is 1.6%. None of the 5 diagnostic markers, when used in isolation, had adequate sensitivity and specificity to accurately predict an IAN nerve exposure in a clinical setting.
authors.affiliation: Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA. slsb@u.washington.edu
authors.forename: O Ross
authors.initials: OR
authors.lastname: Beirne
authors.forename: Philippe
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Hujoel