Temporomandibular Disorder, Arthralgia and Risk Indicators in a Young Population

Objective: Evaluate the risk indicators for Arthralgia Temporomandibular in a young population. Methods: A cross-sectional study, with a sample of 489 students of Campeche Mexico. 49% were women with an average age of 16.7 ± 1.3 between 13 and 24 years. The Arthralgia Temporomandibular was diagnosed as pain in one or two joints during palpation in the region of Temporomandibular Joint at maximum unassisted opening, or maximum assisted opening, at the moment of side's excursion and crepitus joint sounds absence, using the Research Diagnostic Criteria for Temporomandibular Disorders RDC/TMD (LeResche 1992). The evaluations were conducted by 3 standardized examiners (kappa = 0.90), using daylight and tongue depressors. The socio-demographic indicators such as age, gender and clinical indicators as bruxism, interference in balance, interference protrusive, bad restorations, loss of teeth posterior and cross-bite, open bite, were considered Results: The prevalence of Arthralgia temporomandibular was 5%. In order to evaluate the interaction and control the confusion, it was builted a logistic regression model with all variables that were significant in the bivariate analysis. The coefficient of the final equation was: Arthralgia = bad restorations * cross-bite (2.26) + cross-bite (0.91) + bad restorations (0.26). Conclusion: interaction was found between bad restorations and cross-bite. We can conclude that the effect of the bad restorations on the arthralgia temporormandibular depends on the presence of cross-bite.