Association between age and severity of malocclusion in the pediatric age: a cross-sectional study

The establishment and subsequent worsening of a malocclusion is the result of a combination of factors dominated by the interaction between inheritance and environment and follows a dynamic process of temporal evolution. This transversal study, based on a sample of 579 children from the Caserta area in Southern Italy, investigates the potential worsening of malocclusions with age by measuring the relationship between the severity level of orthodontic abnormalities, evaluated through the IONT-DHC classification, and the age of the subjects. Our results show that a statistically significant association exists (p < 0.0001) between the overall severity of the malocclusion and the age of the subjects, underlining the importance of an early orthodontic prevention and highlighting that large sections of the population still need to be sensitized to orthodontic problems.