Radiographic Features of Periodontal Osseous Defects: Evaluation on Digitalized Images

The periodontal status radiographic evaluation is a difficult process due to the countless limitations inherent of this complementary exam and lack of image specificity of the different types of osseous defects. OBJECTIVES: To employ the digital image resource to describe the radiographic features of different types of periodontal osseous defects, artificially produced in dry mandibles. METHODS: Forty periodontal osseous defects (eight types) were produced in fourteen dry mandibles: crater, horizontal, vertical, one, two, and three walls osseous defects, radicular septum and radicular septum with apical extension. Standardized digital photographs and conventional radiographs were obtained from each region, before and after the simulation of the referred defects. Soon afterwards, the radiographs were digitalized. The images were exposed on the computer monitor and evaluated by three examiners. RESULTS: The descriptive analyses of the data showed that the majority of the osseous defects showed distinct image characteristics, allowing its identification, except to the one, two and three walls osseous defects. The radicular septum defect was the most difficult to be evaluated while the horizontal and vertical defects were the easiest to be interpreted. CONCLUSIONS: Although it is important to the treatment clinical decision, the image diagnosis of the different periodontal osseous defects types is extremely difficulty. In this study, the use of digital tool in the radiographic images interpretation makes the process easy.