To customize a miniaturized ultrasound transducer to access full-mouth B-mode, color Doppler and spectral Doppler imaging for monitoring oral health.

A customized periodontal ultrasound transducer SS-19–128 (19 MHz, 128 channels) 1.8 cm wide and 1 cm thick was developed and connected to a data acquisition (DAQ) system. B-mode, color Doppler, and spectral Doppler data could all be collected with SS-19–128. The imaging resolution and penetration capacity of SS-19–128 were characterized on phantoms. The gingival thickness was measured on 11 swine teeth by SS-19–128 for comparison to conventional transgingival probing via Bland-Altman analysis and Pearson correlation. Five human subjects were then recruited to demonstrate B-mode and Doppler imaging by SS-19–128.

The axial and lateral spatial resolution at 5.5 mm depth is 102.1 µm and 142.9 µm, respectively. The penetration depth in a tissue-mimicking phantom is over 30 mm. In vivo B-mode imaging of all 28 teeth was demonstrated on one human subject, and imaging of tooth #18 was accessed on five human subjects. Gingival thickness measurement compared with transgingival probing showed a bias of −0.015 mm and SD of 0.031 mm, and a r = 0.9235 (p < 0.0001) correlation. In vivo color and spectral Doppler imaging of the supraperiosteal artery in human gingiva was performed to generate hemodynamic information.

The small size of SS-19–128 offers important advantages over existing ultrasound technology—more specifically, whole-mouth scanning/charting reminiscent of radiography. This is nearly a two-fold increase in the number of teeth that can be assessed versus conventional transducers.