Validation of anatomically shaped cranial collimation (ACC) in orthodontic lateral cephalography.

The use of an anatomically shaped cranial collimator (ACC) to reduce patient dose in orthodontic lateral cephalography was investigated in this study. The aim was to evaluate the potential interference of the ACC on landmark identification for orthodontic cephalometry. Consecutive orthodontic patients underwent a total of 100 cephalograms using an ACC mounted on a Veraviewepocs(®) 3D X550 (J. Morita Co., Kyoto, Japan) X-ray unit. 10 observers were asked whether the identification of 5 landmarks close to the collimated area was hindered or rendered impossible by the presence of the collimator. Of the 500 landmarks that were judged by the 10 observers, 496 (99.2%) were reported to lack hindrance. In three landmarks, a minority of the observers reported hindrance. In 1 landmark, 8 of the 10 observers reported hindrance by the collimator. In no instance did the observers state that the identification of landmarks was impossible as a result of the collimation. Application of the ACC on the cephalostat of the X-ray unit is a viable way of reducing patient dose, as it only marginally interferes with the diagnostic yield of the exposure. The need to retake images when the ACC is applied was found to be extremely low.