Applicability of Demirjian's method of age assessment in a North Indian female population.

AIM This study was conducted to determine whether the standards of dental maturation given by Demirjian et al. are applicable to North Indian children and to assess the relationship between dental age and chronological age. METHODS In this study OPGs of 100 females of 8-14 years were taken, and dental age was calculated according to the Demirjian method. Chronological age was recorded and compared to dental age. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS Collected data was statistically analysed. Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to correlate the dental and chronological age of the 100 girls. The statistical analysis was done by using SPSS version 10.0 software (SPSS Inc., Chicago IL). For all tests the p-value of <0.05 was considered for statistical significance. RESULTS A strong correlation was found between chronological and dental ages. CONCLUSION In the present pilot work it was concluded that the Demirjian method of dental age assessment showed high accuracy when applied to North Indian paediatric population.