Journal article

Publication year: 2020

Journal: PLoS ONE

Volume number: 15

Issue number: 12

ISSN: 1932-6203

Open access status: Gold

DOI Link: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0244678

Publisher: Public Library of Science

Abstract: 
Video observation (VO) is an established tool for observing toothbrushing behaviour, however, it is a subjective method requiring thorough calibration and training, and the toothbrush position is not always clearly visible. As automated tracking of motions may overcome these disadvantages, the study aimed to compare observational data of habitual toothbrushing as well as of post-instruction toothbrushing obtained from motion tracking (MT) to observational data obtained from VO. One-hundred-three subjects (37.4 +/- 14.7 years) were included and brushed their teeth with a manual (MB; n = 51) or a powered toothbrush (PB; n = 52) while being simultaneously video-filmed and tracked. Forty-six subjects were then instructed how to brush their teeth systematically and were filmed/tracked for a second time. Videos were analysed with INTERACT (Mangold, Germany); parameters of interest were toothbrush position, brushing time, changes between areas (events) and the Toothbrushing Systematic Index (TSI). Overall, the median proportion (min; max) of identically classified toothbrush positions (both sextant/surface correct) in a brushing session was 87.8% (50.0; 96.9), which was slightly higher for MB compared to PB (90.3 (50.0; 96.9) vs 86.5 (63.7; 96.5) resp.; p = 0.005). The number of events obtained from MT was higher than from VO (p < 0.001) with a moderate to high correlation between them (MB: rho = 0.52, p < 0.001; PB: rho = 0.87; p < 0.001). After instruction, both methods revealed a significant increase of the TSI regardless of the toothbrush type (p < 0.001 each). Motion tracking is a suitable tool for observing toothbrushing behaviour, is able to measure improvements after instruction, and can be used with both manual and powered toothbrushes.

Harvard Citation style: Ganss, C., Klein, P., Giese-Kraft, K. and Meyners, M. (2020) Validation of motion tracking as tool for observational toothbrushing studies, PLoS ONE, 15(12), Article e0244678. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0244678

APA Citation style: Ganss, C., Klein, P., Giese-Kraft, K., & Meyners, M. (2020). Validation of motion tracking as tool for observational toothbrushing studies. PLoS ONE. 15(12), Article e0244678. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0244678