Dental X-Ray – Is It Dangerous?
August 4th, 2009
Many of those who have to treat their teeth quite often know what a dental x-ray means. The procedure has been completely studied and there are no secrets from the client. However, many persons consider that it may bring harm to their bodies by extending radiation. Fortunately it’s a myth. It can be easily calculated that even if you practice dental x ray quite often, its effects on your health are virtually insignificant.
To better understand the topic, it would be correct if you get to know some more details about the dental x ray, in general, and what the dental x-ray unit is. Imagine the sunlight. You surely know how it looks like, how it feels and how it falls onto all objects’ surfaces.
The dental x-ray represents the same energy as the visible light, with only one difference – it’s more powerful and can go through our body. Both can make an image on photographic film. Light makes pictures of the “outside” of objects, dental x-rays make pictures of the “inside” of objects.
The radiation is measured in “rem” units. However, a rem is too large, something like miles for length. That’s why modern dentistry uses the millirem (mrem) unit. A rem equals to 1,000 mrem.
A dental x-ray unit is the specially designed machinery that creates dental x-ray photons and makes them escape in a narrow beam. The beam passes through a series of filters on its way to the patient. A camera on the other side of the patient records the pattern of x-ray light that passes all the way through the patient’s body.
A dental x-ray unit permits the dentist to create a negative. This picture represents an image where the areas that are exposed to more light appear darker and the areas that are exposed to less light appear lighter. Hard material, such as bone, appears white, and softer material, such as gums or cavities, appears black or gray.
A panoramic dental x-rays is done to show the whole view of the jaws, teeth, sinuses, nasal area, and temporomandibular joints. These dental x rays are not done when you need to find a cavity. The panoramic dental x-ray shows impacted teeth, bone abnormalities, cysts, solid growths, infections, and mandible fractures. Besides, it needs a special machine that rotates around the head.
Now, to make you understand how harmless is a dental x-ray procedure some facts will be brought. To make a typical dental x-ray image means to be exposed to only 2 or 3 mrem. The National Council on Radiation Protection (NCRP) suggests that the average U.S. citizen receives about 360 mrem per year from background sources, and 5,000 mrem per year form all other radiation sources.
It means that outer space, radioactive materials in the earth, small amounts of radioactive material in most foods we consume, living in a brick house instead of a wood one, cooking with natural gas, flying in an airplane, and even sleeping next to someone affects us more than we could imagine. Comparing to the dental x-ray unit effects, it’s easy to realize that even several visits to the x-ray dentist per year won’t harm you much.
You might also like these related dental health articles
- Causes of Tooth Decay: Killing Bacteria
- Taking Control of TMJ
- Wisdom Tooth Extraction Procedure
- New Dental Implants - Mini Dental Implants
- Family and Cosmetic Dentistry
Categories: Dentists
x-rays and other rays(alpha, beta, delta, infrared… rays) are useful in the medical field, but we know all the negative effects .. a result like cancer, let people be afraid from unnatural matters used in food, medicine, some consumer electronics …
Other topics in the same field will be good from you. thanks.
I lost two of my molers because the x-rays can not penetrate
my metal caps. As far as detecting cavities with x-rays with
crowns it is usless. My dentist can see the gum line where the cap meets and see any suspect decay. This info is always left out of any article.