Evaluation of Shade Matching Accuracy of Smartphone Application compared to Conventional Visual Method: An Observational Pilot Study

Abstract

Introduction: Shade selection has been always a challenging step for a dentist by using a shade guide in manual visual selection. “Colour Grab” application of the smartphone simplifies the procedure of shade selection by providing L a* b* values. Aim: To evaluate the accuracy of the Smartphone application in shade selection compared to the visual method of shade selection. Materials and Methods: This observational pilot study was conducted at Maratha Mandal Dental College, Belagavi, Karnataka, India, from January 2022 to March 2022. A total of 30 subjects were examined by five observers for shade selection using two methods - 1. Conventional visual method, 2. Smartphone application. A total of 300 samples were collected by the both methods. Colour grab application was used to determine L a* b* values of Vita Classic Shade tabs at a distance of 25 cm on neutral grey background and tabulated. Data was collected and subjected to statistical analysis. Cronbach’s alpha test for interobserver reliability analysis, intraclass correlation test and Spearman rho correlation tests were used to determine the inter-observer and intra-observer shade selection accuracy respectively. Results: A total of 30 subjects (Females-16, Males-14) of age between 18-40 years were observed and analysed. For observers 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, the correlation coefficients were 0.962, 0.849, 0.824, 0.930 and 0.793 respectively at p-value <0.01 for all observers which was highly significant. This test showed that there was strong correlation between the two techniques for each observer which had excellent consistency. Conclusion: Colour Grab smartphone application can be used as an alternative method to conventional visual method in shade selection.

Keywords

• colour grab application
• shade selection
• vita classical shade guide