Aim

The aim of this study was to assess the accuracy of Dolphin VTO prediction in patients requiring extraction treatment by comparing the VTO-predicted values and post-treatment values.

Method

Digital pre and post-treatment lateral cephalograms of 52 patients having Class I bimaxillary protrusion were taken and transferred in Dolphin Imaging software for analysis and VTO prediction. A composite analysis was made containing 17 dental and soft tissue parameters (Holdaway, Mc Namara, Rakosi, Steiners, and Tweed analysis).

Results

A comparison between post-treatment and VTO-predicted values showed that software was able to predict soft tissue changes accurately in regions such as nose, inferior sulcus depth, and chin region (p > .05). In dental changes, software was able to predict the inclination of upper incisors to Sn and palatal plane correctly (p > .05). Parameters for other areas such as upper and lower lip, position of upper and lower incisor show significant difference in their VTO and post-treatment values (p < .05) showing inaccuracy of the software.

Conclusion

The VTO prediction of dental and soft tissue changes was significantly different from the post-treatment values for parameters such as superior sulcus depth, lower lip to h line, subnasal to h line, upper lip thickness, lip strain, nasolabial angle, interincisal angle, Ui-NA, Li-NB, and IMPA. For nasal prominence, inferior sulcus depth, chin thickness, UI-SN, and UI-PP, there was no significant difference seen. Since, for most of the parameters, a significant difference was found between the post-treatment and the predicted values, so it was inferred that the software-based VTO prediction could not be fully relied for any treatment planning.