## 3 Results  
Descriptive statistics of the sample's skeletal age are shown in Table 1. The overall intra-observer agreement between the two measurements of the CVM method was very high ([PERSON]'s kappa = 0.912, \(p<0.001\)) and the inter-examiner agreement was also very high ([PERSON]'s kappa = 0.864, \(p<0.001\)). In group 1, no statistically significant association was found between the six skeletal age subgroups and the BALP (rho = 0.060, \(p=0.690\)) and OC concentrations (rho = \(-0.049\), \(p=0.746\)). Table 2 shows the mean levels of BALP and OC in the saliva among the six subgroups and between the three pubertal phases, respectively. The Kruskal-Wallis test showed no statistically significant differences between the mean values of the six skeletal age subgroups in the levels of BALP (\(p\) = 0.568) and OC (\(p\) = 0.996) in saliva. However, the highest concentration values of BALP were observed in CS3 (27.7 ng/mL), which corresponds to the growth peak, followed by CS4 (15.66 ng/mL). The lowest values of BALP were observed in stages CS6 and CS2, with 12.28 and 9.98 ng/mL, respectively. OC levels reached their peak in CS2 (1.70 ng/mL). The lowest values were observed in CS1 (1.36 ng/mL) and CS5 (1.31 ng/mL). \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c} \hline \hline
**CS Stages** & **n** & **Age (Years)** \\
**Mean (SD)** & & **Mean (SD)** \\ \hline
1 & 11 & 9.78 (1.34) \\
2 & 11 & 10.13 (1.55) \\
3 & 8 & 11.07 (1.14) \\
4 & 13 & 13.02 (1.49) \\
5 & 10 & 13.76 (1.64) \\
6 & 2 & 14.35 (0.05) \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} CS: Cervical stage; SD: Standard deviation.  
\end{table} 
Table 1: Descriptive statistics of the skeletal and chronological age of the sample. In Group 2, where three maturation subgroups were created for further analysis, as shown in Tables 3 and 4, BALP values showed higher values in the pubertal stage (CS3-CS4) with mean values of 19.87 ng/mL, followed by the post-pubertal stage (CS5-CS6) with 12.79 ng/mL and the pre-pubertal stage (CS1-SC2) with 11.98 ng/mL. However, these differences were not statistically significant (\(p\) = 0.349). OC levels, on the other hand, showed higher values in the pre-pubertal stage with a mean value of 1.53 ng/mL, followed by the pubertal stage (1.45 ng/mL) and the post-pubertal stage (1.35 ng/mL). These differences, as shown in Table 5, were also not statistically significant (\(p\) = 0.878). \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c} \hline \hline
**Pubertal Stages** & **n** & **Mean (SD)** & **Median (Min, Max)** & \(p\)**-Value \({}^{*}\)** \\ \hline Pre-pubertalal (CS1–CS2) & 20 & 1.53 (1.52) & 0.91 (0.12, 5.64) & \\ Pubertal (CS3–CS4) & 21 & 1.45 (1.58) & 0.56 (0.04, 5.68) & 0.878 \\ Post-pubertalal (CS5–CS6) & 12 & 1.35 (1.50) & 0.57 (0.14, 4.16) & \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \({}^{*}\)Kruskal-Wallis test; CS: Cervical stage; SD: Standard deviation; OC: Osteocalcin.  
\end{table} 
Table 4: Level of OC (ng/mL) in saliva according to the pubertal growth phase. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline \hline
**CS Stages** & **n** & **Mean (SD)** & **Median (Min, Max)** & \(p\)**-Value \({}^{*}\)** \\ \hline \multicolumn{4}{c}{BALP (ng/mL)} \\ \hline
1 & 11 & 13.98 (10.7) & 14.40 (1.04, 33.58) & \\
2 & 11 & 9.98 (7.79) & 7.32 (0.54, 24.26) & \\
3 & 7 & 27.7 (31.85) & 17.98 (7.92, 98.44) & \\
4 & 13 & 15.66 (12.95) & 14.40 (0.60, 47.08) & \\
5 & 10 & 12.84 (5.93) & 11.31 (6.54, 23.12) & \\
6 & 1 & 12.28 & 12.28 (12.28, 12.28) & \\ \hline Total & 53 & 15.13 (14.97) & 12.28 (0.54, 98.44) & \\ \hline \multicolumn{4}{c}{OC (ng/mL)} \\ \hline
1 & 10 & 1.36 (1.30) & 0.91 (0.12, 3.84) & \\
2 & 10 & 1.70 (1.77) & 1.25 (0.14, 5.64) & \\
3 & 8 & 1.55 (1.69) & 1.10 (0.06, 5.20) & \\
4 & 13 & 1.39 (1.58) & 0.56 (0.04, 5.68) & \\
5 & 10 & 1.31 (1.52) & 0.57 (0.14, 4.16) & \\
6 & 2 & 1.57 (1.96) & 1.57 (0.18, 2.96) & \\ \hline Total & 53 & 1.46 (1.51) & 0.66 (0.04, 5.68) & \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} \({}^{*}\)Kruskal-Wallis test, CS: Cervical stage; SD: Standard deviation; BALP: Bone alkaline phosphatase.  
\end{table}