Reliability of soft tissue references for anteroposterior measurement of dental bases

The aims of the present investigation were to devise a new anteroposterior measurement of maxillomandibular discrepancies that would consider both hard and soft tissue contributions, and to verify the correlation of this measurement to a well-established linear assessment of anteroposterior discrepancy. On the pretreatment lateral cephalographs of 300 orthodontic patients (162 males, 138 females) aged between 6 and 50 years, the Wits appraisal and a new "soft tissue" Wits appraisal (linear distance between the projections of soft tissue A and B points on the bisecting occlusal plane) were measured. In the analyzed sample, the former was more variable than the latter. The two measurements were significantly correlated to each other without sex- or age-characteristic patterns. From the correlation, reference values for the new measurement were estimated and found to be between -1.9 mm and 5.4 mm for individuals with a normal occlusion. The new measurement could allow a more careful evaluation of the soft tissue drape together with the underlying hard tissue structure