Validation of third molar maturity index (I 3M ) for discrimination of juvenile/adult status in South Indian population

Abstract

Abstract:Deliberate falsification of age was considered to be one of the main reasons for forensic age estimation of the living individuals. This posed to be a challenging task during criminal and legal proceedings, and ultimate care must be taken not to classify juveniles as adults. Third molars are the only developing teeth during late adolescence and early adulthood. Our study was designed to analyze the usefulness of the third molar maturity index (I3M) specific cut-off value (I3M <0.08) to discriminate adults (≥ 18 years) and juveniles (<18 years) in South Indian children.216 panoramic radiographs (114 females and 102 males) of living subjects aged between 14 and 21 years were analyzed. Our results demonstrated high sensitivity (83.3% and 90.2%) and specificity (98.3 % and 95.1%) for females and males respectively. The positive likelihood ratios of being adult were 50.00 and 18.35 while the negative likelihood ratios were 0.17 and 0.10 in females and males respectively. The estimated posttest probability was 98.0% in females and 94.8% in males. The obtained results showed that the specific cut-off value of I3M <0.08 may be a useful additional tool in discrimination of individuals who are around 18 years of age.

Validation of the Third Molar Maturation Index (I3M) to assess the legal adult age in the Portuguese population

“…Over the last years, I 3M was successfully validated worldwide, in Europe 2 , 13 – 23 , Africa 1 , 24 – 27 , Asia 5 , 28 – 31 , America 3 , 32 – 36 and Oceania 37 . Overall, I 3M had considerable reliability among all countries, however, to date, this method is not validated for a Portuguese sample.…”

Cameriere’s European formula for age estimation: A study on the children in Bosnia and Herzegovina

“…1 In children and adolescents, there are different medico-legal and forensic questions, like the age of criminal responsibility or adult age, where dental age estimation can help to answer. [2][3][4][5][6] According to the Study Group on Forensic Age Diagnostics (AGFAD; http://agfad.uni-muenster.de) 2 , the examination of different independent developmental systems including teeth is combined, to increase the accuracy of estimated age. 7 For children and juveniles, the radiographs of hand-wrist and the teeth are the most reliable for assessing skeletal and dental development.…”

Age estimation in Brazilian adults by Kvaal’s and Cameriere’s methods

“…The best option for age estimation in vivo is through the indirect evaluation of dental structure by means of a simple, nondestructive radiographic examination that generates images of clinically invisible structures. 10,11,12,13 Table 3. Mean error between real age and estimated age by the Kvaal et al 9 and Cameriere et al 4 Table 4.…”

“…The analyzed sample was obtained using digital radiology, and some authors 7,11,15 state that despite the quality of the digital radiographs, there are difficulties in identifying the points of reference for the realization of the measurements, whether they were linear or for the demarcation of the area in pixels. The conditions of visualization (monitor, resolution, image quality, external light) and human limitations can influence the quality of the measurements obtained in the techniques of age estimation.…”