The efficiency of dental volumetric tomography for determining the bone density and comparison with DEXA

In the recent literature, several approaches have been taken to measure bone density in the jaws and to compare bone density in the jaws with bone densities in other parts of the skeleton. In dental clinical and radiological practice it is useful to have an idea of the jaws? bone density and quality for treatment planning and prognose.Dual energy x-ray absorbsiometry (DEXA) is a technique that enables fast, noninvasive, and highly precise measurement of bone mineral density. In this study, the method of dental volumetric tomography (DVT) which possibly presents the excellent 2 and 3 dimentional imaging by preventing bone superpositions, was assesed about it?s effects on determining bone density. The evaluations are made on 120 postmenapausal women?s DVT images, who are diagnosed as normal, osteopenic and osteoporotic according to WHO criteria, and the values are compared with the patients? DEXA parameters.Radiomorphometric analyses and dansitometric measurements which were made earlier on panoramic radiographs and by medical computed tomography devices, were both used assessing DVT?s features presented for bone tissue. As a result, it was observed that DVT measurement parameters as mandibular cortical thickness, dental volumetric cortical thickness and maxillary Hounsfield units (HU) values were statistically significant between the groups and decreased in osteoporotic individuals; maxillary HU, mandibular HU, maxilla and mandible data profile (intensity) evaluations were effective for detecting osteoporotic individuals and both maxilla and mandible bone densities were decreased in osteoporotic group.In the case of detecting bone density and bone quality, it is necessary to make new researches on the study groups which contain more patients in wide age range with using multiple DVT devices and software to achieve definitive results.Key Words: Dental volumetric tomography, dual energy x-ray absorbsiometry, bone density, metabolic bone diseases, osteoporosis.