Causes of tooth extraction at a tertiary care centre in Pakistan

Objective: To evaluate the frequency of common causes of permanent tooth extraction and severity of dental condition at the time of tooth extraction. Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted at the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Punjab Dental Hospital, Lahore, Pakistan, from February to June 2010, and involved 1026 patients who were referred for the extraction of permanent teeth. The inclusion criteria comprised caries, periodontitis, restoration failure, trauma, and local pathologies, while 3rd Molar impactions, supernumerary tooth extraction and extractions done as part of orthodontic or prosthodontic treatment were excluded. Oral hygiene was recorded using the Simplified Oral Hygiene Index. SPSS version 17 was used for statistical analysis. Results: The mean age of the study population was 46.60 +/- 11.321 years, and there were 611 (59.6%) males. A total of 1178 teeth were extracted. Advanced dental caries was the leading cause of tooth extraction (n=743; 63.1%), followed by periodontitis (n=309; 26.2%) restoration failure (n=54; 4.6%), trauma (n=38; 3.2%) and miscellaneous local pathologies (n=34; 2.9%). More than half of the patients (n=540; 52.6%) had poor oral hygiene. Conclusion: Advanced dental caries is the most common cause behind tooth extraction.