Diagnosis of cracked tooth: Clinical status and research progress

Abstract

Cracked tooth is a common dental hard tissue disease.The involvement of cracks directly affects the selection of treatment and restoration of the affected teeth.It is helpful to choose more appropriate treatment options and evaluate the prognosis of the affected tooth accurately to determine the actual involvement of the crack.However, it is often difficult to accurately and quantitatively assess the scope of cracks at present.So it is necessary to find a real method of early quantitative and non-destructive crack detection.This article reviews the current clinical detection methods and research progress of cracked tooth in order to provide a reference for finding a clinical detection method for cracked tooth.

Keywords: Cracked tooth; Diagnosis; Nondestructive; Quantitative detection.

Fig. 1

There was no obvious crack image on the apical film, but there was obvious bone destruction around the root of the affected tooth. Extensive bone destruction surrounding the root can serve as a diagnostic reference for root-involving fractures.

Fig. 2

(A) MRI can identify some hidden cracks and is less affected by filler artifacts, (B) but the ability to identify hidden cracks is unstable.[78,79].

Fig. 3

Contrast medium can enhance the ability of CBCT to identify cracked teeth, so that CBCT can recognize some previously undetectable cracks.

Fig. 4

A variety of nondestructive testing methods have been tried to quantify the cracked teeth.(A)(B)(C) separately show that the identification of optical polarization imaging system,Vibrothermography and X-ray dark field tomography of carcked tooth, , .