EXAMINING THE IMPACT OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN DENTISTRY: A COMPREHENSIVE SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

Background: Artificial Intelligence (AI) in dentistry has the potential to revolutionize oral healthcare by solving its inherent shortcomings. Aim: To review and evaluate the body of research on artificial intelligence's use in dentistry, with a focus on how it affects treatment planning, diagnosis, and patient care in a range of dental specialties. Methodology: 30 papers encompassing oral diagnosis, surgery, endodontics, prosthodontics, orthodontics, forensic dentistry, radiography, and periodontics are thoroughly examined in this review using PRISMA guidelines. The Cochrane Handbook principles were followed in the evaluation of important variables such as randomization, blinding, withdrawal/dropout rates, sample size estimation, clarity of inclusion/exclusion criteria, examiner reliability testing, pre-specification of outcomes, and bias risk. The Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) was used in quality assessment to measure bias risk and star ratings. Results: The research highlight improvements in diagnosis, treatment planning, and procedural accuracy, illustrating the revolutionary effects of AI in dentistry. Applications of AI demonstrate its versatility and include automated designs, risk prediction, lesion recognition, and precision in dental operations. There is little chance of bias in randomization, intervention variations, and outcome assessments, according to the methodological evaluation, which shows excellent scientific rigor. Even though a few studies had minor issues including uneven blinding and missing data, these had no appreciable impact on the dependability of the results. Overall, the studies' consistent methodological quality highlights how AI may be relied upon to advance dental research and practice.