Radiation dose to the lens in sequential and spiral CT of the facial bones and sinuses.

A tendency for over-utilization of the radiological examinations of facial bones and sinuses has been observed. The radiosensitive lens is exposed to radiation during such examination. Comparison of routine roentgenography and spiral axial and coronal CT in sequential and spiral acquisition modes with different mAs values was undertaken using Alderson Rando Phantom. The spiral-CT technique with pitch 1.5 performed in the coronal plane gave the lowest radiation dose to the lens as compared with other CT methods and only seven times higher than routine sinus roentgenography.