Distribution of developmental defects of tooth enamel by tooth-type in 11-12-year-old children in South Wales.

The distribution of enamel developmental defects in 759 11-12-yr-old children from South Wales is described. Overall, 8% of maxillary teeth were affected compared to 3.6% of mandibular teeth. Most teeth were affected equally on right and left sides of the mouth except for maxillary lateral incisors, which had significantly more defects on the right (P less than 0.05) and maxillary first molars, which had significantly more defects on the left (P less than 0.025). Maxillary central incisors (18.7%) were affected by enamel defects most often followed by maxillary first molars (8.1%) and maxillary lateral incisors (7.2%). The ranking order of the teeth varied when the prevalence of the different types of defects was assessed. White demarcated opacities were seen most often in maxillary central incisors (10.8%), yellow demarcated opacities in maxillary first molars (1.8%), diffuse opacities in maxillary central incisors (6.6%) and hypoplasias in mandibular first premolars (1.5%). Defects of all types occurred most frequently on the buccal surfaces of the teeth. In premolar and molar teeth more defects occurred on the occlusal surface than on the lingual.