title: Radiopacity of tantalum-loaded acrylic bone cement.
abstract: Radiopacifying agents are commonly added to bone cements to enhance the visibility of the cement in radiography. The radiopacifiers usually employed may, however, have undesired effects on the mechanical properties of the cement. A potentially new radiopacifier is tantalum, which in the present work was evaluated in terms of radiopacity. Bone cements containing different percentages of tantalum were compared with plain bone cement as well as with formulations containing different percentages of the commonly used radiopacifier barium sulphate. The radiopacity was assessed quantitatively and qualitatively, by measuring with a digital densitometer the optical density of the cement on X-ray films, and consulting the expertise of ten orthopaedic surgeons. It was found that tantalum does present radiopacity, but not as high as barium sulphate under the specific conditions applied to this study.
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio di Tecnologia Medica, Istituti Ortopedici Rizzoli, Via di Barbiano 1/10, Bologna 40136, Italy. persson@tecno.ior.it
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Persson
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Guandalini
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Baruffaldi
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Pierotti
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Baleani
mesh_terms: D015502:Absorptiometry, Photon; D003287:Contrast Media / Q000737:chemistry*; D008422:Materials Testing; D019904:Polymethyl Methacrylate / Q000737:chemistry*; D011856:Radiographic Image Enhancement / Q000379:methods*; D013635:Tantalum / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D003287:Contrast Media; D013635:Tantalum; D019904:Polymethyl Methacrylate