ABSTRACT
The Peer Assessment Rating (PAR) index is a British occlusal index that measures the severity of dental malocclusion and has been used in several investigations that have evaluated the effectiveness of orthodontic treatment provision in Europe. As part of its development, the PAR index was validated for malocclusion severity, by using the opinions of a panel of 74 dentists and orthodontists. The present investigation was carried out to validate the PAR index, by using the opinion of an American panel of orthodontists. Eleven orthodontists examined a sample of 200 sets of study casts and rated them for malocclusion severity and perceived treatment difficulty. Multiple regression techniques were used to evaluate the predictive power of the components of malocclusion on the panel's scores. Weightings were calculated from the partial regression coefficients and, when these weightings were applied to the PAR index, the association between the panel's opinion and the PAR index scores was increased.
Subject(s)
Malocclusion/diagnosis , Orthodontics, Corrective/standards , Peer Review, Health Care , Analysis of Variance , Humans , Models, Dental , Observer Variation , Orthodontics, Corrective/statistics & numerical data , Outcome and Process Assessment, Health Care/standards , Regression Analysis , Reproducibility of Results , Severity of Illness Index , United StatesABSTRACT
Recent advances in cosmetic dentistry have led to the development of a variety of new products and techniques including vital bleaching and ceramic brackets. Therefore this study was conducted to see whether the use of an at-home carbamide peroxide bleaching agent before bonding affected the tensile bond strength of a precoated ceramic orthodontic bracket. Sixty extracted human premolar teeth were randomly separated into three groups of 20. Group 1 was a control group that was etched and bonded in the usual manner. Group 2 was immersed in a carbamide peroxide home bleaching agent for 72 hours before pumicing and bonding. Group 3 was also bleached for 72 hours but was immersed in distilled water for 1 week before bonding. The results indicated that recently bleached teeth have significantly reduced bond strength values when compared with both groups 1 and 3. We suggest that if a patient is using a tooth whitening product, that they discontinue its use at least 1 week before the bonding of orthodontic attachments.
