DENTAL DEVELOPMENT IN APERT SYNDROME

Objective: Apert syndrome has been extensively studied and described, However, an area that has not been studied is the dental development o f these individuals, The purpose of this study was to evaluate the dev elopment of the dentition and compare it with that of unaffected child ren, There appears to be clinical observations indicating delayed erup tion of the permanent teeth in the Apert child. Methods: This retrospe ctive study examined all Apert syndrome patients from four craniofacia l centers who had a panoramic radiograph taken before the age of 16 ye ars. Thirty-six individuals, 19 boys and 17 girls ranging in age from 4.1 to 15.8 (mean = 9.3) years were examined,The seven left mandibular permanent teeth, second molar to central incisor, were rated on an ei ght-stage scale (A-H) using methods described by Demirjian and Goldste in (1976), The stage of each tooth was converted to the corresponding numeric value, and then all seven values were added to obtain a dental maturity score, which corresponded to a dental age, based on the samp le of 4500+ normal children of the Demirjian et al, study. The dental age and chronologic age were compared using a paired t test, The corre lation between chronologic age and length of delay was also determined . Results: Thirty-one of 36 individuals had a dental age lower than th eir chronologic age, Compared to the normal sample, the mean developme ntal dental delay was 0.96 years (p < .001), The range in delay was 0. 5 years advanced to 2.9 years delayed, There was a positive correlatio n to increased age with greater delay in dental development (p < .05). Conclusion: Our study confirmed our clinical impressions: The results showed a mean developmental delay of 0.96 years, with a trend of incr easing delay with increased age, This positive correlation found betwe en increased age and increased delay parallels the general growth of A pert children, with a greater degree of delay as the child grows older .