THE RELIABILITY OF FOVEAE PALATINAE IN DETERMINING THE LOCATION OF VIBRATING LINE IN EDENTULOUS PATIENTS

Abstract

The objective of this cross-sectional study was to determine the reliability of foveae palatinae for locating the position of the vibrating line in edentulous patients. The study was conducted in a ter-tiary care dental hospital in Islamabad, Pakistan on a sample of 150 completely edentulous patients. Clinical examination of the soft palate area was conducted to assess for the location of the vibrating line, whether it was at, anterior to or posterior to the foveae. Interestingly, foveae were not present in 27.2% of the sample. When present, 32.5% patients had foveae present at the level of vibrating line, 31.1% had vibrating line posterior to foveae palatinae ,while only 8.6% presented with vibrating line anterior to fovea palatinae. Within the limitations of the present study, it was concluded that foveae palatinae are not a reliable anatomical landmark for determining the position of the vibrating line.