The Use of Cone Beam Computed Tomography for the Evaluation of Pathology, Developmental Anomalies and Traumatic Injuries Relevant to Orthodontics

The objective of this work is to illustrate pathologic conditions relevant to orthodontists who use dental cone beam computed tomography (CBCT) images. A total of 1703 cases from 2300 CBCT images taken from June 2006 to May 2009 were reviewed, and interesting cases that might be related to orthodontic treatment or evaluation were selected. A total of 427 cases were selected. The conditions included supernumerary tooth (84 cases), missing tooth (29 cases), impacted tooth (35 cases of impacted canine), external root resorption (7 cases), root fracture (18 cases), simple bone cyst (13 cases), dentigerous cyst (58 cases), abscess (33 cases), osteomyelitis (51 cases), odontoma (8 cases), mucus retention cyst (20 cases), temporomandibular joints (70 cases), and cleft palate (11 cases), including surgical correction with/without bone grafting, cortical bone width (buccal and lingual cortical bone around the roots), impacted tooth and tooth-button-traction, surgical positioning of orthodontic mini-implants for anchorage and others. The conditions presented here are common on 2-dimensional radiographic images but may not look familiar with computed tomography images. The CBCT images with 3-dimensional capabilities provided fine details of the dental conditions and allowed fine bony changes to be detected from different viewing angles.