Glossary of dentistry

This is a list of definitions of commonly used terms of location and direction in dentistry.

This set of terms provides orientation within the oral cavity, much as anatomical terms of location provide orientation throughout the body.

The abbreviations should be used only in restricted contexts, where they are explicitly defined and help avoid extensive repetition (for example, a journal article that uses the term "mesiodistal" dozens of times might use the abbreviation "MD").

The abbreviations are ambiguous: (1) they are not specific to these terms; (2) they are not even one-to-one specific within this list; and (3) some of the combined terms are little used, and the abbreviations of the latter are even less used.

The combined terms include apicocoronal (AC), buccoapical (BA), buccocervical (BC), buccogingival (BG), buccolabial (BL), buccolingual (BL), bucco-occlusal (BO), buccopalatal (BP), coronoapical (CA), distoapical (DA), distobuccal (DB), distocervical (DC), distocoronal (DC), distogingival (DG), distolingual (DL), disto-occlusal or distoclusal (DO), distopalatal (DP), linguobuccal (LB), linguo-occlusal (LO), mesioapical (MA), mesiobuccal (MB), mesiocervical (MC), mesiocoronal (MC), mesiodistal (MD), mesiogingival (MG), mesio-occlusal or mesioclusal (MO), mesiopalatal (MP).

This X-ray film depicts some of the teeth in the lower right quadrant. The arrows point in the following directions: distal ← , mesial → , coronal ↑ , apical ↓ .
An occlusal view of a complete maxillary denture . The green line, indicating the dental midline , is the defining line when it comes to mesial-distal direction. The blue arrow, which indicates a mesial direction, applies to the opposite side as well up until the green line. The red arrow is directly buccal to the right first maxillary molar, and the name label for the patient (Martin) is embedded in the resin directly palatal to the same tooth.
Dental quadrants
This photo shows teeth #2-5 ( Universal numbering system ). Tooth #3, the upper right first molar , has an MO (mesial-occlusal) gold inlay . This molar is both posterior, as well as distal, to the premolars in front of it.