We appreciate the interest regarding our article. We are glad to clarify these points for the readers of the AJO-DO .

The letter stated that dental development is a multifactorial phenomenon and the factors that might affect dental development were not discussed. We agree about its multifactorial feature, and major factors were taken into account in the subject selection. It was stated in the methods section of the article that “Patients with developmental anomalies such as ectodermal dysplasia, cleft lip or palate, and Down syndrome, as well as patients who had undergone previous orthodontic treatment, were excluded from the study.” The letter stated that malocclusion is another factor that might affect dental development according to recently published data ; however, this is relatively new information and was not taken into account in our study. Also, dental development in children with hypodontia and skeletal anomalies might be evaluated in another study.

The letter stated that a similar study, which compared dental development in hypodontic and hyperdontic children (Kan et al ), was not cited; however, our study was submitted in 2008, accepted in 2009, and published in 2011.

This was a retrospective study. The radiographs of the children were selected from the archives of the Department of Pediatric Dentistry at Ondokuz Mayis University in Samsun, Turkey. In previous studies, similar statistical analyses were used. The power of our study was not calculated as in other studies. Furthermore, our concern about the number of subjects was emphasized in the “Discussion” as a limitation of our study.