title: The validity of different display monitors in the assessment of dental implant site dimensions in cone beam computed tomography images.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine if the differing contrast resolution of various LCD monitors affects the reliability or accuracy of measurements of proposed implant sites.
  
  
  METHODS
  Edentulous areas of human dry skulls were marked with radiopaque markers in order to standardize the plane of the transverse cross-sections of the ridges and path of measurements. The skulls were imaged by a CBCT device and the images stored in proprietary format on the workstation. The data sets were then transferred, with the proprietary reformatting software, to two different laptops using CDs. Transverse cross-sectional images of the ridges were reformatted on all three computers and ridge dimensions were recorded using the linear measurement tool of the proprietary software. Ridge dimensions were recorded directly from the three different monitors by two observers and compared to measurements recorded directly from the bone. The measurement errors and intra- and inter-examiner reliability were calculated for each monitor and compared with each other.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Intra- and inter-examiner reliability scores for the measurements recorded from all three devices were very high and ranged between 0.993-0.999. The mean of the absolute errors was 0.55 mm for the workstation, 0.61 mm for laptop 1 and 0.68 mm for laptop 2. The absolute errors were statistically significant for all three monitors (p-value < 0.001), but there was no statistically significant difference between the absolute errors obtained from the three monitors.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  No differences in the reliability or accuracy of measurements of implant site dimensions were obtained using color LCD monitors with different contrast resolution capabilities.
authors.affiliation: Department of Oral Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences, College of Dentistry, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. asma.alekrish@gmail.com
authors.forename: Asma'a A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Al-Ekrish
authors.forename: Mohamed I H
authors.initials: MI
authors.lastname: Ekram
authors.forename: Wafa
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Al Faleh
authors.forename: Mustafa
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Alkhader
authors.forename: Ra'ed
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Al-Sadhan
mesh_terms: D015921:Dental Implants; D006801:Humans; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D015921:Dental Implants