Maxillary Incisive Canal Characteristics: A Radiographic Study Using Cone Beam Computerized Tomography

Abstract

Background. The incisive canal located at the midline, posterior to the central incisor, is an important anatomic structure of this area to be considered while planning for immediate implant placement in maxillary central incisor region. The purpose of the present study is to assess incisive canal characteristics using CBCT sections. Materials and Methods. CBCT scans of 79 systemically healthy patients, with intact maxillary incisors, were evaluated by two calibrated and independent examiners. Assessments included (1) mesiodistal diameter, (2) labiopalatal diameter, (3) length of the incisive canal, (4) shape of incisive canal, and (5) width of the bone anterior to the incisive foramen. Results. The mean width of the foramen labiopalatally and mesiodistally was 3.12 ± 0.94 mm and 3.23 ± 0.98 mm, respectively. Mean canal length was 18.63 ± 2.35 mm and males have significantly longer incisive canal than females. The mean width of bone anterior to the incisive canal was 6.32 ± 1.43 mm. As age of the subjects increased, incisive foramen diameter and incisive canal length were found to be increased. Cylindrical shaped incisive canals were seen in most of the individuals followed by funnel shaped and hour-glass shaped canals, and banana-like canal is least prevalent type. Conclusion. The findings from the present study suggest that the diameter and length of incisive canal vary among different individuals and presence of very thin bone anterior to the canal would suggest that a pretreatment CBCT scan is a valuable tool to evaluate anatomic variations, morphology, and dimensions of incisive foramen before immediate implant placement in maxillary central incisor region.

Anatomical evaluation of the nasopalatine canal using CBCT (Cone Beam Computed Tomography): Method validation in open source software

“…In a study by Güncü et al, (2013) there was significance for IF diameter by sex only for dentate participants (p <0.0001). Other studies have found no statistical differences for IF diameter by sex, although the value was higher for male participants (Bornstein et al, 2011;Gönül et al, 2016;Hakbilen & Magat, 2018;Jain et al, 2016;Soumya et al, 2019;Thakur et al, 2013). In the p study, age did not significantly affect the IF diameter, similar to other investigations (Acar & Kamburoğlu, 2015;Etoz & Sisman, 2014;Gil-Marques et al, 2020;Gönül et al, 2016;Hakbilen & Magat, 2018;Thakur et al, 2013).…”

“…Bornstein et al, (2011) has reported a decrease in NPC dimensions, when accompanied by an increase in bone resorption. Other studies however, report no association between average NPC length and gender (Panjnoush et al, 2016;Soumya et al, 2019) or dental condition (Panjnoush et al, 2016;Thakur et al, 2013). Despite the edentulous participants being older, no correlation was observed between NPC length and age in the present study.…”

“…Some studies have claimed that there is a negative correlation between NPC size and age (Fernández-Alonso et al, 2014;Gönül et al, 2016;Jain et al, 2016). In another study using 79 CBCTs, NPC length increased with increasing age (Soumya et al, 2019). Bornstein et al, (2011) reported that the age of patients had an important effect on NPC distance, with average values generally decreasing with increasing age.…”

“…For anatomical examination of the NPC, previous studies have used imaging exams obtained from spiral computed tomography (Güncü et al, 2013;Tözüm et al, 2012) and computed micro-tomography (micro CT) (Fukuda et al, 2015). CBCT's three-dimensional imaging can accurately reveal anatomical appearances and variations in the NPC (Soumya et al, 2019). In the studies mentioned, morphological evaluations used measurements of the distance between two points in the sagittal and axial planes.…”

“…The sample size was defined by non-parametric analysis using two-way ANOVA (2x2) in a calculation performed in EXCEL software (Soumya et al, 2019). Given the individualities of the study, the magnitude of effect considered was the average value of 0.25.…”