Absorbed doses and energy imparted from tomography for dental implant installation. Spiral tomography using the Scanora technique compared with hypocycloidal tomography.

Tomography is sometimes needed to obtain information on the amount of bone available in the maxilla and in the posterior parts of the mandible prior to implant surgery. Both conventional and computed tomography can be employed. Recently a new imaging device, the Scanora, has been introduced which can be used for spiral tomography. The aim of this study was to compare absorbed doses and energy imparted from this new unit with those from conventional hypocycloidal tomography using the Philips Universal Polytome. A multi-film cassette with five pairs of calcium tungstate screens was used in the latter while a single film technique was used with the Scanora. The absorbed dose measurements were made on an anthropomorphic phantom. Most absorbed doses were found to be below 0.2 mGy except those to the major salivary glands. The absorbed doses with the Scanora were higher than with the Polytome. The beam direction and shorter focus-object distance in the Scanora influenced the absorbed dose distribution. The energy imparted was found to be low for both techniques, 1.8-1.9 mJ with the Scanora for both jaws, and for hypocycloidal tomography 0.78 mJ in the maxilla and 1.3 mJ in the mandible.