Exploring the Utility of Dental Pathological Conditions in Dental Radiographic Comparisons

Dental forensic identifications can be achieved through comparative dental analysis(CDA) by comparing a decedent’s postmortem (PM) dental records to a suspected match’s antemortem (AM) dental records. Dental records are particularly useful for CDA, because the number of concordant dental identifiers (DI) and the presence of discrepancies present in a dental radiograph has a demonstrated impact on forensic practitioners’ ability to interpret dental radiographs for positive identification. However, few studies have tested how matching accuracy is influenced by individuals’ experience and expertise in conjunction with testing the utility of pathological dental identifiers. Therefore, in this study, a survey questionnaire was designed 1) to test if the presence/absence of dental pathological conditions and dental restorations would lead to more correct matches when CDAs are conducted in medicolegal death investigation (MDI), 2) to determine if respondents’ expertise and experience would affect their ability to make correct matches, and 3) to investigate which DI were most/least beneficial in making correct matches. To test these hypotheses, 60 decedents' dental radiographs (i.e., one antemortem and one post-mortem) were collected from the Washoe County Regional Medical Examiner's Office (WCRMEO) and compiled into a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire survey was administered on Qualtrics XM Software to a sample of respondents (N=6) with known experience and expertise in dental anthropology, the forensic sciences, and forensic odontology. The sixty arrays were divided into four sections by match/non-match and presence/absence of dental restorations and/or pathological conditions. Results from this study suggest that the presence of DI has a notable effect on match accuracy rates, particularly when radiographs are of the same individual; although, the non-match category with pathological conditions had a higher accuracy rate than the arrays without pathological conditions, even though the difference was small. In addition, no respondents achieved a perfect score in the questionnaire survey, and there no differences among respondents groups. These results indicate that people with known experience and expertise in dental anthropology, the forensic sciences, and forensic odontology may be able to make correct matches in CDA; however, comparative literature suggests that only people with dental qualifications and experience should conduct CDAs in MDI