RESUMO
Fifty-six consecutive patients in a referral-based practice seeking treatment for a complex chronic painful temporomandibular disorder (TMD) were enrolled in a retrospective study to evaluate the skeletal relationship of patients with TMD compared to the distribution of skeletal patterns found in the average population. During the standard clinical workup, lateral cephalometric radiographs were performed. Using Wits appraisal all of the fifty-six (56) cephalometric radiographs were analyzed. Based on the results of the Wits analysis, 34.6 percent of the patients were skeletal Class I, 63.6 percent were skeletal Class II, and 1.8 percent were skeletal Class III. These results were compared with the data published by the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) in Proffit's text Contemporary Orthodontics. This study states that in the general population occlusal diversity is eighty to eighty-five percent (80-85%) skeletal Class I, fifteen percent (15%) are skeletal Class II, and one percent (1%) are skeletal Class III. The conclusion can be drawn that the patient sampling analyzed shows that TMD patients have a higher prevalence for skeletal Class II than the general population.
