Intro to My Findings on Digital X-ray vs. Traditional X-ray Technology

    How many of you when your hear the word "dentist" cringe and think of pain? Most likely a majority of you! Unfortunately, dentists get a bad reputation as health professionals as being the white coat mad scientists that want to mess with a very personal part of your body-your mouth! The truth is, when I hear the word "dentist", I think my career choice and possibly (hopefully) becoming a dentist one day. I look forward to one day having patients that hear "dentist" and look forward to receiving high quality oral healthcare from a guy that loves his job and giving back. In the meantime, all I can do for you folks is provide some insightful information on what different dentists (and possibly yours) are using on a daily basis to check out those teeth of yours. I've had the opportunity to check  quite a few dental practices/clinics as an intern, volunteer, and patient so I thought I knew  a lot about how things work in the dental field. Well...When I thought about it a little (a lot) more, I realized that there is a huge technological sphere surrounding the dental field that is constantly growing.

    I decided to delve deeper into the discoverer of cavities and overall oral hygiene: the X-ray! This led me and my research to contact the source that knows best about the X-ray machine and ask various dentists about  "What type of technology is used in their office and how may it be different than others?" 

    I had also decided to survey people in person and ask "How many of your dentists have the following technology? Traditional x-ray machines and generators, digital x-rays and computers, CAD-CAM, other."

http://www.fiveparksdental.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/digital_x-ray196133407_std.136182132.jpg  Figure 1. Digital X-ray Technology
                       
     I surveyed several different dentists located in various demographics about the X-ray technology that they use in their office along with other questions pertaining to the subject. The survey was written by me and based on what I felt were appropriate questions for the dental professionals regarding my topic of research.

http://antiquescientifica.com/photo_x-ray_and_disk_generator_with_doctor_c._1900.jpg
                                  Figure 2. 1900 X-ray machine and generator

    Technology in society is constantly getting more advanced and in order to keep up with it, dental professionals are forced to pay a lot of money. I think my project reflects how much the younger demographic may not recognize how paramount going into the dentist is and getting a digital x-ray may be while the latter, adults cannot only look back and see and extreme difference on dental X-rays and procedures, but can also project a possible future more advanced.

        http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~khoshnev/Research/Research_files/image032.jpg

Figure 3. CAD-CAM Technology