EVALUATION OF THE QUALITY OF DIGITAL PANORAMIC IMAGES WITH SAFE BEAM EXPOSURE TECHNOLOGY AND MANUAL DOSE ADJUSTMENT IN PATIENTS WITH DIFFERENT BMI: A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

Background & Aims: Body Mass Index (BMI) is a factor that affects the quality of panoramic images. This study aimed to evaluate the quality of panoramic digital images with Safe Beam Exposure (SBE) and manual dose adjustment among patients with different BMI levels. Material & Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 200 patients, aged 20-60 years who were prescribed panoramic radiography in the course of their treatment were selected randomly as samples. 50% of the subjects were allocated to the manual dose adjustment group and 50% were distributed randomly to the SBE technology group. After grading quality of the images, scores were entered into the SPSS software. Results: The mean age of participants was 37.96±11.96. 53.5% of participants were women and 46.5% were men. 87% of the samples fell in BMI of 18.5 ≤to ≥30. The overall quality of the images included noise (p=0.0003), contrast (p=0.0001), density (p=0.0002), and resolution (p=0.0003) and anatomical indicators included Laminadora (p= 0.0003), edge sharpness of teeth (p = 0.0002), mandibular canal walls (p = 0.0001), apex end of upper molar teeth (p= 0.0002), and DEJ limit (p= 0.0002). SBE technology in various categories of BMI was better than manual dose adjustment. Conclusion: SBE technology could be used as a new technology to obtain images with higher quality and better anatomical resolution in various categories of BMI. As BMI decreases, the diagnostic quality of the different anatomical landmarks examined in the panoramic images increases.