Assessment Of Reliability of Dental Pulp Tissue in Forensic - A Comparative Analysis Under Different Conditions

Abstract

Introduction: Teeth have the ability to resist adverse environmental conditions and the pulpal tissue is well protected, thus ensuring that the histopathological features and blood group antigen from the pulp remains stable for long duration. Forensic odontology is an investigative aspect of dentistry that analyses dental evidence for human identification.

Aim of the study: To evaluate reliability of dental pulp in ABO blood group estimation under burial, drowning conditions at different time intervals.

Materials and Methods: The study was conducted on 20 patients. The capillary blood samples were obtained by finger prick method, the blood grouping and rhesus typing was done by slide agglutination method for each of the 20 patients and considered as controls. The pulp obtained from the extracted teeth of the same 20 patients was considered as a case. The cases were divided into 2 groups based on the time interval of pulp extirpation and examination for blood grouping & rhesus typing after extraction. All the samples were stored in water and mud for a certain time interval.Group I (pulp extirpation on day of extraction), Group II (pulp extirpation after one week of extraction). Blood grouping, Rhesus typing for extirpated dental pulp was done by modified absorption elution method. The results of the cases were compared with the respective controls to arrive at conclusions.

 Results: In Group I (n = 10), Group II (n = 10),the results of blood group estimation by all two groups matched completely and showed 100% sensitivity.

 Conclusion: Teeth are the one of hard structures and resist adverse environmental conditions. The pulp tissue within the tooth is well protected and remains stable retaining the reliability of the blood group antigen for at least up to 6 months. Thus, it could be concluded from the present study that the dental pulp tissue can be used with good reliability in person identification in drowning and burial cases also.