Abstract
President Clinton's Health Security Act proposes the formation of large scale health plans with improved quality assurance. Dental radiography consumes 4% ($ 1.2 billion in 1990) of total dental expenditure yet regular systematic office quality assurance is not performed. A pilot automated method is described for assessing density of exposed film and fogging of unexposed processed film. A workstation and camera were used to input intraoral radiographs. Test images were produced from a phantom jaw with increasing exposure times. Two radiologists subjectively classified the images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. A computer program automatically classified global grey level histograms from the test images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. The program correctly classified 95% of 88 clinical films. Optical density of unexposed film in the range 0.15 to 0.52 measured by computer was reliable to better than 0.01. Further work is needed to see if comprehensive centralized automated radiographic quality assurance systems with feedback to dentists are feasible, are able to improve quality, and are significantly cheaper than conventional clerical methods.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 247-254 |
| Number of pages | 8 |
| Journal | Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology |
| Volume | 78 |
| Issue number | 2 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 1994 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Fingerprint
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- Pathology and Forensic Medicine
- Dentistry(all)
Cite this
Centralized automated quality assurance for large scale health care systems. A pilot method for some aspects of dental radiography. / Benn, Douglas; Minden, Nick J.; Pettigrew, James C.; Shim, Minbo.
In: Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology, Vol. 78, No. 2, 1994, p. 247-254.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Centralized automated quality assurance for large scale health care systems. A pilot method for some aspects of dental radiography
AU - Benn, Douglas
AU - Minden, Nick J.
AU - Pettigrew, James C.
AU - Shim, Minbo
PY - 1994
Y1 - 1994
N2 - President Clinton's Health Security Act proposes the formation of large scale health plans with improved quality assurance. Dental radiography consumes 4% ($ 1.2 billion in 1990) of total dental expenditure yet regular systematic office quality assurance is not performed. A pilot automated method is described for assessing density of exposed film and fogging of unexposed processed film. A workstation and camera were used to input intraoral radiographs. Test images were produced from a phantom jaw with increasing exposure times. Two radiologists subjectively classified the images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. A computer program automatically classified global grey level histograms from the test images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. The program correctly classified 95% of 88 clinical films. Optical density of unexposed film in the range 0.15 to 0.52 measured by computer was reliable to better than 0.01. Further work is needed to see if comprehensive centralized automated radiographic quality assurance systems with feedback to dentists are feasible, are able to improve quality, and are significantly cheaper than conventional clerical methods.
AB - President Clinton's Health Security Act proposes the formation of large scale health plans with improved quality assurance. Dental radiography consumes 4% ($ 1.2 billion in 1990) of total dental expenditure yet regular systematic office quality assurance is not performed. A pilot automated method is described for assessing density of exposed film and fogging of unexposed processed film. A workstation and camera were used to input intraoral radiographs. Test images were produced from a phantom jaw with increasing exposure times. Two radiologists subjectively classified the images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. A computer program automatically classified global grey level histograms from the test images as too light, acceptable, or too dark. The program correctly classified 95% of 88 clinical films. Optical density of unexposed film in the range 0.15 to 0.52 measured by computer was reliable to better than 0.01. Further work is needed to see if comprehensive centralized automated radiographic quality assurance systems with feedback to dentists are feasible, are able to improve quality, and are significantly cheaper than conventional clerical methods.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=0028486715&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=0028486715&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/0030-4220(94)90155-4
DO - 10.1016/0030-4220(94)90155-4
M3 - Article
VL - 78
SP - 247
EP - 254
JO - Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology and Oral Radiology
JF - Oral Surgery, Oral Medicine, Oral Pathology and Oral Radiology
SN - 2212-4403
IS - 2
ER -