SynthesisInternational journal of legal medicine2019
A systematic review and meta-analysis of the fully formed wisdom tooth as a radiological marker of adulthood.
Synthesis in International journal of legal medicine, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Evidence of Age Estimation Procedures in Forensic Dentistry: Results from an Umbrella Review.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2023Pooled it
- How old are you? A systematic review investigating the relationship between age and mandibular third molar maturity.PloS one · 2023Pooled it
- Magnetic resonance imaging for forensic age estimation in living children and young adults: a systematic review.Pediatric radiology · 2020Pooled it
- Comparing an Indian dataset with BioAlder using Demirjian's staging of the third molar.International journal of legal medicine · 2026Article
- End-to-end vs. human-defined feature extraction: comparing deep learning approaches for age classification using mandibular third molars.The Journal of forensic odonto-stomatology · 2025Article
- Radiologic assessment of third molar development and cervical vertebral maturation to validate age of majority in a Mexican population.International journal of legal medicine · 2025Article
- Magnetic Resonance Images for the Prediction of Chronological Age Using Maxillary Third Molar Teeth: An Observational Study.Clinical, cosmetic and investigational dentistry · 2024Article
- Estimating the 18-Year Threshold with Third Molars Radiographs in the Southern Italy Population: Accuracy and Reproducibility of Demirjian Method.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Comparison of the third molar maturity index (IInternational journal of legal medicine · 2021Article
- Comparison of two established 2D staging techniques to their appliance in 3D cone beam computer-tomography for dental age estimation.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- A new model of classification of third molars development and its correlation with chronological age in a Brazilian subpopulation.International journal of legal medicine · 2021Article
- Forensic Validity of the Third Molar Maturity Index (BioMed research international · 2020Article
- Validation of the third molar maturity index (I3M): study of a Dominican Republic sample.The Journal of forensic odonto-stomatology · 2019Article
- Age estimation using pulp/enamel volume ratio of impacted mandibular third molars measured on CBCT images in a northern Chinese population.International journal of legal medicine · 2019Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
2 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Assessment of third molar development on dental radiograms is one of the most commonly used methods of forensic age estimation. Despite widespread use and numerous studies, there is a paucity of aggregated data on how well a fully mature third molar identifies adulthood (> 18 years), the most important threshold in a medicolegal context. Therefore, a systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted. A total of 1229 studies were screened, and 82 studies were assessed for inclusion. Twenty-four studies, with a pooled cohort of 19,690 individuals, presented true positive (TP), true negative (TN), false positive (FP), and false negative (FN) outcomes, enabling meta-analysis. The outcomes were based on using the third molar in the fully mature stage as a diagnostic test to indicate age 18 years or above. The false positive rate (fall-out/1-specificity) was 3.1% (95% CI 2.1-4.6%), and the true positive rate (recall/sensitivity) was 51% (95% CI 44-58%). Diagnostic accuracy was 71%. These findings, while reassuring in terms of the low false positive rate, highlight the need for complementary age estimation methods to avoid a significant number of false negatives.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.