Forensic dentistry: a systematic review

Abstract

Introduction: It was verified that the identifications carried out by forensic dentists in mass disasters reach about 70% of the identifications in the world. With the population increase in recent decades, mass disasters have increased, both in natural catastrophes and by anthropic action, making it imperative to increase the numbers of forensic identification methods, to accelerate the recognition of fatal victims and the teeth are the only elements that can be used for identification. Objective: It was to highlight the importance of professional specialist in forensic dentistry and their diligence in the investigative process, to increase the diligence of greater richness of details and optimized work for the recognition of the bodies. Methods: The systematic review rules of the PRISMA Platform were followed. The search was carried out from February to April 2023 in the Scopus, PubMed, Science Direct, Scielo, and Google Scholar databases, using articles with different dates up to 2022. The quality of the studies was based on the GRADE instrument and the risk of bias was analyzed accordingly, according to the Cochrane instrument. Results and Conclusion: A total of 119 articles were found, 38 articles were evaluated and 32 were included and developed in this systematic review study. Considering the Cochrane tool for risk of bias, the overall assessment resulted in 28 studies with a high risk of bias and 32 studies that did not meet GRADE. the function of the forensic dentist in investigations of charred victims is notorious. The analysis performed by a professional with specific training in the field of dentistry is essential, and the importance of medical records, photographs, and radiographs for proper identification must also be considered. However, it is necessary to increase and improve the activities of forensic dentists in the work of recognition of charred bodies, being imperative to a set of factors for the elucidation of cases so that the identifications are complete. It is concluded that it is necessary to use several methods to optimize the practice of forensic dentistry, from cases of identification through the oral cavity, which was the beginning of the history of forensic identification in the field of dentistry, to the nowadays, its rise in history was analyzed for an effective elucidation of recognition of charred bodies.