title: Gingival biotype assessement: visual inspection relevance and maxillary versus mandibular comparison.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This clinical study was aimed at evaluating the accuracy of gingival visual inspection procedures during clinical examination and determining whether differences existed between the maxillary and mandibular gingival biotypes.
  
  
  METHODS
  The study included 53 patients and 124 clinicians. The clinicians were asked to assign to each subject, using photographic documents, one of three biotypes: thin-scalloped, thick-scalloped, or thick-flat gingival biotype. A total of 19716 responses were collected for statistical analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Identification accuracy of the gingival biotype and the intra-examiner repeatability presented poor highlighting of the limited relevance of visual inspection. In addition, the percent of agreement between classifications based on the global view of both the maxilla and mandible and the classification based on the individual mandibular or maxillary anterior teeth was not statistically significant.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Based on the above results, it can be concluded that a simple visual inspection is not effective for the identification of gingival biotype. Furthermore, evidence suggests that a difference of biotype between the maxilla and the mandible in the same patient is conceivable. Therefore, orthodontic clinical examination should incorporate a reproducible method of determining the individualized gingival biotype for each group of teeth that will be moved.
authors: Department of Orthodontics, School of Dentistry, Nantes, France.
authors: Madline
authors: M
authors: Cuny-Houchmand
authors: Stéphane
authors: S
authors: Renaudin
authors: Mustapha
authors: M
authors: Leroul
authors: Lucie
authors: L
authors: Planche
authors: Laurent Le
authors: LL
authors: Guehennec
authors: Assem
authors: A
authors: Soueidan
keywords: Clinical examination; gingival biotype; mandible; maxilla; visual inspection.
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