[Clinical studies of the proper indication of inlay and crown therapy in lateral tooth areas].

187 students were examined an epidemiological study for their dental conditions and requirements with respect to preservation and prosthetics. The persons tested showed a DMF-T index of 11.6 and a DMF-S index of 24.2 in the lateral tooth area. In our opinion the clinical investigation revealed that the total number of caries cases will rise three-fold due to the above-average frequency of secondary caries cases as the filling size (or the number of filling surfaces) increases. The amount of single crown dentures found in the lateral tooth area with 0.1 crowns per person tested turned out to be fairly low. The actual need for a tooth-preserving therapy concept by crowning in preference to the concept of filling therapy amounts to the twelve-fold of the existing single crown dentures.