ROOM FOR IMPROVEMENT - THE ACCURACY OF DENTAL PRACTITIONERS WHO DIAGNOSE BONY PATHOSES WITH RADIOGRAPHS

Objectives. The impact of any effort aimed at improving diagnostic acc uracy by improving clinical decision making in diagnostic radiology wi ll be limited by the ability of the clinician to correctly recognize t he presence of abnormalities on radiographs. We carried out a study de signed to examine whether dentists are able to correctly identify vari ous kinds of periapical bone lesions visible an intraoral radiographs and diagnose their pathologic nature. Study design. General dental pra ctitioners (n = 98) assessed 32 radiographs that showed either normal bone (10) or one abnormality (22) in the periapical bone. The ''gold s tandard'' for pathosis was histopathologic analysis. The dentists were asked to judge for the presence of an abnormality and to decide wheth er an active pathologic process was present. Results. On average denti sts identified 81% of all visible abnormalities correctly. Subsequentl y, they diagnosed 59% of all the pathologic cases correctly. Dentists, however, incorrectly identified 55% lesions on radiographs when exper ts had stated that no abnormality was visible. Conclusion. There is ro om for improvement of diagnostic accuracy of bony pathology.