Automated detection and labelling of teeth and small edentulous regions on cone-beam computed tomography using convolutional neural networks.

OBJECTIVE: To assess the accuracy of a novel Artificial Intelligence (AI)-driven tool for automated detection of teeth and small edentulous regions on Cone-Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) images. MATERIALS AND METHODS: After AI training and testing with 175 CBCT scans (130 for training and 40 for testing), validation was performed on a total of 46 CBCT scans selected for this purpose. Scans were split into fully dentate and partially dentate patients (small edentulous regions). The AI Driven tool (Virtual Patient Creator, Relu BV, Leuven, Belgium) automatically detected, segmented and labelled teeth and edentulous regions. Human performance served as clinical reference. Accuracy and speed of the AI-driven tool to detect and label teeth and edentulous regions in partially edentulous jaws were assessed. Automatic tooth segmentation was compared to manually refined segmentation and accuracy by means of Intersetion over Union (IoU) and 95% Hausdorff Distance served as a secondary outcome. RESULTS: The AI-driven tool achieved a general accuracy of 99.7% and 99% for detection and labelling of teeth and missing teeth for both fully dentate and partially dentate patients, respectively. Automated detections took a median time of 1.5s, while the human operator median time was 98s (P<0.0001). Segmentation accuracy measured by Intersection over Union was 0.96 and 0.97 for fully dentate and partially edentulous jaws respectively. CONCLUSIONS: The AI-driven tool was accurate and fast for CBCT-based detection, segmentation and labelling of teeth and missing teeth in partial edentulism. CLINICAL SIGNIFICANCE: The use of AI may represent a promising time-saving tool serving radiological reporting, with a major step forward towards automated dental charting, as well as surgical and treatment planning.