Perception of image quality in direct digital radiography after application of various image treatment filters for detectability of dental disease.

This study evaluated dentists' perception of the quality of digitally captured radiographs. Thirty radiographs were taken with the Visualix digital video radiographic system, 10 periapicals for tooth and bone anatomy, 10 periapicals for bone disease and 10 bitewings for dental caries. Three numeric copies were made of each image and treated with three different filters: 'optimize', 'enhance' and 'enhance + smooth', respectively. Four images of the same case were displayed simultaneously in a random sequence on the monitor. Twenty dentists ranked each set of four images on a scale from 1 to 4. In general, most dentists preferred a treated image to the original. The optimized and enhanced images were selected most frequently as first or second choice from the tooth and bone anatomy and bone disease groups. The original image was ranked lowest in more than half (55%) of the series. For the bitewings, the smoothed images were ranked significantly higher. In conclusion, image treatment possibilities should be offered in digital radiography as the majority of dentists preferred a treated image to the original version. The image treatment chosen seemed to be task dependent; less treatment was required to delineate the more subtle tissue differences.