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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Oral. Health
Sec. Oral Health Promotion
Volume 5 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/froh.2024.1456377
This article is part of the Research Topic Digital Technology for Oral Health Care and Dental Education View all articles

Palatal Rugae Assessment Using Plaster Model and Dental Scan: A cross-sectional comparative analysis

Provisionally accepted
Laura Roselli Laura Roselli 1Federica Mele Federica Mele 1Carmela Suriano Carmela Suriano 2Valeria Santoro Valeria Santoro 1Roberto Catanesi Roberto Catanesi 1MASSIMO PETRUZZI MASSIMO PETRUZZI 1*
  • 1 University of Bari Aldo Moro, Bari, Italy
  • 2 University of Foggia, Foggia, Apulia, Italy

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objective: Palatal rugae due to their consistent and individualistic patterns, are used in forensic dentistry as ancillary method for personal identification. This study aimed to compare the impression of the PR obtained with the classic alginate impression and casting of the plaster model with the impression of the palate made with an intraoral scanner. Both impressions were compared with each other and with the photo of the palatal rugae. Materials and methods: In this study, 19 patients (13 females, 6 males) mean age of 28.6 years were selected. Two different impressions were taken from the maxillae of the subjects: conventional impression using alginate impression material, and optical impression using an intraoral scanner. The impressions obtained were compared with each other and with the photo of the palatine rugae of each enrolled subject, by the FaceComp TM software. Parameters assessed included absolute and relative distances, perimeters, areas, shape factors, and moments. Statistical analysis was conducted using Python 3.9.The data from digital and plaster models were comparable across all six parameters used by the software. The coefficients of correlation and determination resulted very strong and strong for all six the parameters assessed. No statistically significant differences were detected between the two methods of palatal rugae impression. Conclusions: Both digital and traditional methods were equally reliable in capturing palatal rugae patterns. The use of FaceComp TM software facilitated accurate comparison and personal identification through the alignment of the preidentified landmarks. Further studies are required to enhance the speed and precision of image acquisition and comparison for broader application in personal identification

    Keywords: Laura Roselli: Methodology, investigation, Formal analysis, Writing -original draft, Federica Mele: Investigation, Software analysis. Carmela Suriano Patients recruitment, formal analysis. Valeria Santoro: methodology, formal analysis. Roberto Catanesi: Super-vision

    Received: 28 Jun 2024; Accepted: 28 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Roselli, Mele, Suriano, Santoro, Catanesi and PETRUZZI. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: MASSIMO PETRUZZI, University of Bari Aldo Moro, Bari, Italy

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.