The use of an individual jig in measuring tooth length changes.

The parallel periapical radiographic technique hides several problems that might affect the image seen on the film. To overcome these problems a special jig with an external wire attached to the tooth surface and parallel to its long axis was suggested. This study examines the accuracy of using an external object for measuring root length differences due to angular changes between the tooth and the film. The rule of three was used for all calculations as a compensating formula. A human central incisor was placed in a special jig. Two different wire lengths (11.8 +/- 0.1 mm and 16 +/- 0.1 mm) were attached to the tooth in six different ways. The tooth was radiographed at four different film to tooth angulations. The tooth and wire lengths were measured on the model itself and directly on the scanned film on a computer monitor. The results reveal that a wire, placed nine mm from the crown and parallel to the long axis of the tooth was the best jig for accurately measuring tooth length changes. Neither palatal nor buccal metal wires, intimately attached to the crown of the tooth, can serve as a tool to measure tooth length changes. The study could not find a way to skip the need for a cephalometric radiograph to verify the parallelism between the wire and the long axis of the tooth for this matter.