Interrelationships of dental maturity, skeletal maturity, height and weight from age 4 to 14 years

Abstract

The correlations of dental mineralization stages, skeletal mineralization, body-height and weight were determined for each year between age 4 and 14 for 121 boys and 111 girls of the serial experimental group of the Burlington Growth Centre. Dental development related more strongly to morphological development than to skeletal development in both sexes, and skeletal age was more strongly related to morphological age than to dental stage. The relationship of individual teeth to skeletal age, height and weight were different but consistent in a sex-specific pattern. In males, both skeletal mineralization and dental mineralization, particularly of the first molars, were more closely related to height than to weight. In the females, skeletal and dental mineralization, especially of the second molars, were more closely related to weight from age 7 than to height. These relationships were significant in both pre-adolescent and adolescent years. In both these periods, skeletal age and body size related most strongly to late stages of tooth formation. Hence, from an early age, the stages of dental, skeletal and morphological maturation were significantly interrelated in a pattern that was specific for individual teeth and for sex.