Descriptive epidemiology of dental malocclusion in Najran patients seeking orthodontic treatment

BACKGROUND: Untreated malocclusion can lead to compromised aesthetic function, depression, and low self-esteem. The aim of this study was to evaluate dental malocclusion in Najran, Saudi Arabia as no data existed before. METHOD: This was a retrospective study analyzing the casts of all patients in Najran, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, seeking orthodontic management for malocclusion between 2017 and 2019. MEASUREMENTS: The consultant orthodontist is the single investigator involved in collecting the details of demographics followed by molar relationships, overjet, overbite, crowding and spacing using digital caliper on each dental cast. Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics for IOS Version 25 (Armonk, NY: IBM Corp. RESULTS: A total of 326 patients sought treatment for different types of malocclusion. There were 143 males and 183 females with an M:F ratio of 1:1.3. Age ranged from 6 to 55 years with a mean SD of 22.6 ± 8.98. The prevalence for Class I, II and III malocclusions at 95% CI was (0.76 (0.757, 0.774)), 0.251 (0.243, 0.260) and 0.529 (0.519, 0.539) respectively. Fifty-one (15.6%) patients had reversed overjet, 65 (19.9%) reduced overjet, and 86 (26.4%) increased overjet. One hundred and sixty-four (50.3%) cases of reduced overbite and 99 (30.4%) cases of deep overbite were also observed. Tooth size arch length discrepancy were noticed with crowding and spacing in 83 (26.4%) and 71 (21.8%) patients, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: This study has shown the prevalence of Class I, Class II, and Class III malocclusion to be 72.7%, 11.6% and 15.6% respectively. Increased over jet and crowding was demonstrated in more patients, though it is not statistically significant.