Accuracy of age estimation method by panoramic radiographic examination in paediatric dental patients: A diagnostic study in Indonesia.

Introduction: Cases of violence and criminality in children continue to increase, with implications for the increasing need for identification measures, especially for living victims for judicial or law enforcement purposes. Teeth are one of the indicators that determine a child's identity. The methods often used to estimate a child's age through dental radiographic examination during the period of deciduous and mixed teeth are the Al Qahtani, Demirjian, and Blenkin & Evans methods.

Materials and methods: An analytical cross-sectional study was conducted. The children's ages were estimated using dental examination and 103 digital panoramic radiographs. Descriptive statistics, normality test followed by difference test based on five parameters: p-value Wilcoxon test, Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC), Spearman correlation coefficient, and Bland-Altman analysis by looking at % out of Limit of Agreement and looking at Mean Difference.

Results: Wilcoxon's p-value showed that Blenkin's method and Demirjian's method vs. chronological age were significantly different, whereas Al Qahtani's method was not significantly different. The Demirjian method had the highest ICC. Spearman's correlation coefficient was strongly correlated between Blenkin's and Demirjian's methods and the chronological age (r ≥ 0.8). The Bland-Altman analysis showed that the Demirjian Method had the best % out of LOA = 5.8, while the Al Qahtani Method had the most minor differences.

Conclusion: The Demirjian method showed results closest to the patient's chronological age.