title: In vitro validation of a hand-held optical reflectometer to measure clinically observed erosive tooth wear.
abstract: In this study, we analyzed a newly developed optical reflectometer for measuring erosive tooth wear (ETW) in vitro. Three examiners independently assessed the labial surface of 80 deciduous canines and 75 permanent incisors. One examiner performed visual examinations (BEWE), and the other two used the optical pen-size reflectometer to measure surface reflection intensity (SRI) on the same labial surfaces. The examinations were made in duplicate with at least 1 week interval. Intra- and inter-rater agreements were calculated using weighted kappa analysis for BEWE, and intra-class correlation coefficients (ICC) as well as Bland-Altman plots for SRI. The teeth were separated into without (BEWE 0) or with (BEWE 1-3) ETW, and SRI cut-off points were calculated. Intra-rater agreement for the visual examination was 0.46 and 0.82 for deciduous and permanent teeth, respectively. Inter-rater and intra-rater agreement for SRI were good (ICC > 0.7; p < 0.001). SRI measurements produced high specificity values for deciduous and permanent teeth (≥0.74 and ≥ 0.84, respectively), and lower sensitivity values (≥0.37 and ≥ 0.64, respectively), but permanent teeth had generally higher SRI values (p < 0.05). We observed a significant association between BEWE and SRI (p < 0.05). The optical pen-size reflectometer was able to adequately differentiate ETW on permanent teeth, with highly reliable and reproducible measurements, but ETW on deciduous teeth was less accurately differentiated. The reflectometer is a good candidate for clinical research.
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive, Restorative and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, CH-3010, Bern, Switzerland. thiagosaads@hotmail.com.
authors.forename: Thiago Saads
authors.initials: TS
authors.lastname: Carvalho
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive, Restorative and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, CH-3010, Bern, Switzerland.|School of Dentistry, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
authors.forename: Cristiane Meira
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Assunção
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive, Restorative and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, CH-3010, Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Fabian
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Jost
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive, Restorative and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, CH-3010, Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Walter Bruno
authors.initials: WB
authors.lastname: Bürgin
authors.affiliation: School of Dentistry, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil.
authors.forename: Jonas Almeida
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Rodrigues
authors.affiliation: Department of Preventive, Restorative and Pediatric Dentistry, University of Bern, Freiburgstrasse 7, CH-3010, Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Adrian
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lussi
mesh_terms: D003481:Cuspid; D019229:Dentition, Permanent; D006801:Humans; D007180:Incisor; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D057085:Tooth Wear / Q000175:diagnosis*; D014094:Tooth, Deciduous
keywords: Basic erosive wear examination (BEWE); Dental erosion; Diagnostics; Permanent teeth; Primary teeth; Reflectometer