Local diagnostic reference levels for intraoral dental radiography in the public hospitals of Cyprus.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this study was to determine local DRLs for children and adults undergoing intraoral dental examinations at the intraoral radiology units of the public hospitals in Cyprus.


METHODS
Measurements were made on all the twenty intraoral X-ray units of the public hospitals in Cyprus with the intention to establish the local DRLs for all the possible intraoral X-ray examinations for children and adults. All units are film based. The measurements were made by a Dose Area Product (DAP) meter (GAMMEX RMI 841-RD) placed at the surface of the dental unit's X-ray shaping cone (FSD 20cm). A diagnostic radiology dosimeter (Dosimax Plus A) was also placed at an FSD of 100cm to compare the dose reading between the two dosimeters.


RESULTS
DRLs were established at the 3rd quartile for 7 exposure settings corresponding to 12 types of teeth (Adult and children mandibular and maxillary incisor, premolar and molar) with values of 197, 163, 128, 102, 81, 65 and 49mGycm-2and 7.23, 5.94, 4.75, 3.68, 3.10, 2.41 and 1.88mGy for benchmark nominal exposure times of 1000, 800, 640, 500, 400, 320 and 250ms respectively, at a nominal exposure voltage of 70kVp.


CONCLUSIONS
The local DRLs of the present study compare well with other similar published DRLs.
Biomedical Research Foundation, P.O. Box 24039, 1700 Nicosia, Cyprus. Electronic address: c4stelios@gmail.com.
Stelios
S
Christofides
Medical Physics Department, Nicosia General Hospital, 215 Limassol Old Road, 2029 Strovolos, Nicosia, Cyprus. Electronic address: elinapitri@gmail.com.
Elina
E
Pitri
Medical Physics Department, Nicosia General Hospital, 215 Limassol Old Road, 2029 Strovolos, Nicosia, Cyprus. Electronic address: lampaskis.marios@gmail.com.
Marios
M
Lampaskis
Medical Physics Department, Nicosia General Hospital, 215 Limassol Old Road, 2029 Strovolos, Nicosia, Cyprus. Electronic address: pchris80@yahoo.com.
Christos
C
Papaefstathiou
D000328:Adult; D002648:Child; D003535:Cyprus; D006779:Hospitals, Public; D006801:Humans; D011861:Radiography, Dental / Q000592:standards*; D012016:Reference Values
Adult dental DRLs; Child dental DRLs; DRLs; Dental radiography; Intraoral radiography; Patient dose