Abstract
Objective The main purpose of this article was to determine the correlation of bite force in
maximal intercuspal position (MIP) among patient’s perceptions, clinician subjective
interpretation, and T-Scan III system.
Materials and Methods Forty-three dental students at Naresuan University (Phitsanulok, Thailand) participated
in the study. Subjects were positioned by Frankfurt horizontal plane paralleled to
the horizontal plane and asked to bilaterally clenched in MIP. Patient’s perception
was evaluated by asking which side of the jaw had heavier bite force (right, left,
or equally on both sides). Then, the clinician subjective interpretation was assessed
using traditional occlusal indicators. Furthermore, patient’s bite force was analyzed
using T-Scan III.
Statistical Analysis Cohen’s weighted kappa test was used to evaluate the correlation of bite force.
Results The best correlation between patient’s perception and T-Scan III was at the ± 7.5%
cutoff range with 15 subject agreements. While the best correlation between clinician
subjective interpretation and T-Scan III was at ± 5.0% cutoff range with 23 subject
agreements. Cohen’s weighted kappa indicated slight agreement between T-Scan III and
patient’s perception and fair agreement between T-Scan III and clinician.
Conclusions Clinician subjective interpretation is more clinically reliable than patient’s perception
when T-Scan III is used as a gold standard.
Keywords
T-Scan - bite force - occlusal indicators
