Description

Impacted tooth can be defined as the intraosseous position of the tooth after the expected time of eruption. A large number of completely impacted teeth may be retained in jaw without any symptom. The impacted tooth could be one of the permanent tooth or a supernumerary tooth. Teeth may also become displaced in the jaw due to unknown causes resulting in impaction of the tooth. From the last 40 years, an incidence of impacted teeth is growing through different populations, due to living habits such as feeding by a soft food and lower intensity of the use of the masticatory apparatus. The most common impacted teeth are mandibular and maxillary third molars, followed by the maxillary canines and mandibular premolars. Females are more affected than males. Various lesions and syndromes are associated with impacted and unerupted tooth such as dentigerous cyst, ameloblastoma, ameloblastic fibroma, odontoma, benign cementoblastoma and diseases like cherubism and cleidocranial dysplasia. The gold standard treatment modality in any impaction cases are surgical procedure for the well- being and comfort of the patient.