Morphological evaluation of gonial and antegonial regions in bruxers on panoramic radiographic images

Abstract Background This is the first study to report both cortical and trabecular bone evaluation of mandibles in bruxers, within the knowledge of the authors. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of bruxism on both the cortical and the trabecular bone in antegonial and gonial regions of the mandible, which is the attachment of the masticatory muscles, by using panoramic radiographic images. Methods In this study, the data of 65 bruxer (31 female, 34 male) and 71 non-bruxer (37 female, 34 male) young adult patients (20–30 years) were evaluated. Antegonial Notch Depth (AND), Antegonial-Index (AI), Gonial-Index, Fractal Dimension (FD) and Bone Peaks (BP) were evaluated on panoramic radiographic images. The effects of the bruxism, gender and side factors were investigated according to these findings. The statistical significance level was set atP ≤ 0.05. Results The mean AND of bruxers (2.03 ± 0.91) was significantly higher than non-bruxers (1.57 ± 0.71; P