A guide to dental radiography

With radiology making strong progress, dental radiology is fast gaining popularity both among the patients and the dentists. This method offers many advantages over the traditional methods and is easy to use. Nowadays, almost every dentist in the town has dental X-ray equipment and every dentist is well trained in the essentials of dental radiography and radiology. Read this article which is a guide to dental radiography.

Uses of dental radiography

Dental radiographs are also called as X-rays, which take pictures of the teeth and inside the mouth to give a better picture of the happenings to the dentist. A radiographic picture is produced by an X-ray radiation and it penetrates dental structures at various levels before hitting the film. This produces accurate images for the dentist with which he can treat the patient with ease.

How dental radiography is done

Photographic film When photographic film is exposed to X-ray radiation, it should be developed by exposing the film to various chemicals in a dark room. This can be a lengthy process, and wrong exposures in the development method can cause retakes, which exposes the patient to more radiation. Digital X-rays that change the film with an electronic sensor, take care of some of these issues. Digital X-rays
Digital X-rays can show any decay that is inside your teeth, which are mostly invisible to a normal inspection. If the dentist can spot tooth decay from the inside out, he/she can repair or remove it before it results into a serious problem such as gum disease or other dental diseases.

Advantages of dental radiology

Not every digital radiography tools offer immediate viewing, but many do offer them. While providing treatment for many oral procedures, viewing an image immediately provides a considerable clinical advantage. Usually, traditional radiography films consume large amount of space. Apart from the hassle of films getting misplaced, managing this conventional "dform of ata" is more time-consuming and irrigating. Digital data can be immediately accessed from a computer.

Editing the images

Once developed, traditional imaging cannot be edited. This is a big disadvantage. With digital radiography, the dentist can change the contrast to enlarge the complete image or some parts of it. He can also ensure that there is optimum amount of lighting available on the image.