Radiographic study of mental foramen in Chitwan population

Abstract

Background: Knowledge about the type & position of mental foramen is very much important landmark for dentists to perform any surgical procedure in the vicinity of mental foramen. The pur­pose of this study was to determine the most frequently occurring type & position of the mental foramen in Chitwan population using digital Panoramic Radiograph.
 Methods: This cross-sectional retrospective study was conducted on 500 (250 Male& 250 Female) digital panoramic radiograph which were collected from the department of Oral Medicine & Radi­ology. The type & position of Mental Foramen was analysed with Dicom viewer. The data obtained was statistically analyzed by with descriptive and inferential statistics using SPSS Version 20.
 Result: The most common type of mental foramen was Type 3 (diffuse with a distinct border of the foramen) & the test showed significant difference by gender. The most common position of mental foramen was position 4 (in line with second premolar) followed by position 3 (Between the first & second premolar) with no significant difference with gender with p-value <0.05.
 Conclusions: This study shows that the most frequent appearance of mental foramen lies in the line of second premolar. So this finding is used as a guide line in Chitwan population to perform various type of dental surgical procedure safely in mental foramen region but the accurate radio­graphic identification of mental foramen is paramount.