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- Title
Visual and radiographic caries detection: a tailored meta-analysis for two different settings, Egypt and Germany.
- Authors
Schwendicke, Falk; Elhennawy, Karim; El Shahawy, Osama; Maher, Reham; Gimenez, Thais; Mendes, Fausto M.; Willis, Brian H.
- Abstract
Background: Diagnostic meta-analyses on caries detection methods should assist practitioners in their daily practice. However, conventional meta-analysis estimates may be inapplicable due to differences in test conduct, applied thresholds and assessed population between settings. Our aim was to demonstrate the impact of tailored meta-analysis of visual and radiographic caries detection to different settings using setting-specific routine data. Methods: Published systematic reviews and meta-analyses on the accuracy of visual and radiographic caries detection were used. In two settings (a private practice in Germany and a public health clinic in Egypt), routine data of a total of 100 (<italic>n</italic> = 50/practice) consecutive 12–14 year-olds were collected. Test-positive rates of visual and radiographic detection for initial and advanced carious lesions on occlusal or proximal surfaces of molars were used to tailor meta-analyses. If prevalence data were available, these were also used for tailoring. Results: From the original reviews, 210 and 100 heterogeneous studies on visual and radiographic caries detection were included in our meta-analyses. For radiographic detection, sensitivity and specificity estimates derived from conventional and tailored meta-analysis were similar. For visual detection of advanced occlusal carious lesions, the conventional meta-analysis yielded a sensitivity and specificity (95% CI) of 64.6% (57–71) and 90.9% (88–93), whereas the tailored estimates for Egypt were 75.1% (70–81) and 84.9% (82–89), respectively, and 43.7% (37–51) and 96.5% (95–97) for Germany, respectively. Conclusion: Conventional test accuracy meta-analyses may yield aggregate estimates which are inapplicable to specific settings. Routine data may be used to produce a meta-analysis estimate which is tailored to the setting and thereby improving its applicability.
- Subjects
EGYPT; GERMANY; DIAGNOSIS of dental caries; CONFIDENCE intervals; META-analysis; MOLARS; PHYSICAL diagnosis; PUBLIC hospitals; RESEARCH evaluation; DENTAL radiography; DISEASE prevalence
- Publication
BMC Oral Health, 2018, Vol 18, Issue 1, pN.PAG
- ISSN
1472-6831
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.1186/s12903-018-0561-z