Dental maturity standards in southern Finland.

Dental maturity was studied in 248 healthy children born in Helsinki from 1968-73 and in 105 healthy children living in Turku from 1971-85. In all, 1062 panoramic radiographs of these children aged from 2.5 to 17.2 years, were examined. Dental maturity was estimated by the three methods described by Demirjian et al. (1973) and Demirjian and Goldstein (1976). The aim of the study was to produce reliable dental maturity curves for use in relation to Finnish children. In addition to data for the seven-tooth model, curves and tables for two models utilizing four teeth are also given. It is shown that all of the models work well and predict dental age reliably.