What does the dental charting symbol 'X' indicate?

• A. Missing or extracted tooth.
• B. Tooth is impacted.
• C. Tooth is restored with a crown.
• D. Missing tooth (uncertified context)

Answer: (D)

Recognize how charting marks communicate tooth status at a glance. An X drawn over a tooth space is a quick way to show that the tooth is not present in the mouth. In many charting systems, that marks a tooth as missing because it has been extracted, but when a charting method isn’t standardized, the X can be used to indicate a missing tooth in the record. This makes X the best fit for representing a tooth that is absent in this context. Restorations with crowns, and signs of impaction, are shown with different symbols or notations, so they don’t match the meaning of the X here.