Recently, an 11-year-old girl from Brazil was accidentally found to have as many as 81 teeth in her mouth during a routine dental examination. This discovery far exceeds the number of 32 teeth in the mouth of a normal adult, which has attracted great attention in the medical community.
According to reports from many foreign media such as Vietnam Express, the girl originally went to the hospital to take X-rays for problems with her upper teeth and was preparing for tooth extraction surgery, but she accidentally found that in addition to 18 deciduous teeth and 32 permanent teeth, there were as many as 31 extra teeth in her mouth.
This phenomenon is called “hyperdontia”, a rare congenital disease.
Hyperdontia not only causes disordered tooth arrangement, but also may hinder the growth and development of normal teeth, and even cause oral complications such as swollen gums, blisters, and misaligned teeth.
Usually, patients with this disease will only grow one or two extra teeth at most, and cases like this girl with more than 30 extra teeth are extremely rare worldwide.
The team responsible for the treatment is from the School of Dentistry of the Federal University of Universidade de Ibrahim in Minas Gerais, Brazil. During the treatment, the research team conducted detailed imaging examinations and genetic analysis on the girl to rule out the possibility of related genetic diseases.
Usually, multiple tooth hyperplasia may be associated with genetic diseases such as cleidocranial dysplasia, Gardner syndrome and cleft palate, but the girl did not show these symptoms.
Further chromosome analysis found that the girl’s chromosome 9 had structural abnormalities, that is, some fragments had “inversions”, that is, some fragments of the chromosome were reversed.
Although it is not yet certain whether the gene mutation directly causes dental abnormalities, this is a direction worthy of further study.
Given that some superfluous teeth are buried deep in the gums or have the same appearance as normal teeth, hasty extraction may damage the jawbone, so the treatment team is working with a number of specialists to develop a long-term treatment and correction plan.
In the short term, priority will be given to superfluous teeth that have a greater impact on oral function or aesthetics, and whether to perform orthodontic treatment will be decided based on the specific situation.
Experts suggest that children with multiple abnormal teeth should seek medical attention as soon as possible, and undergo imaging and genetic examinations if necessary to ensure timely intervention to avoid affecting the development of permanent teeth and jaws.
This case has been submitted by the research team to the American Journal of Orthodontics and Maxillofacial Surgery. As one of the rare cases in the world, it provides new ideas for the study of multiple tooth hyperplasia.