Quality Assurance Audit of Digital Intraoral Periapical Radiographs at the Undergraduate Dental Clinics.

OBJECTIVE

To assess the quality of digital intraoral periapical radiographs by investigating the percentage of radiographic images that satisfied the good quality standards.

STUDY DESIGN

An audit.

PLACE AND DURATION OF STUDY

Undergraduate Dental Clinics, Qassim University College of Dentistry, Saudi Arabia, from April to September 2018.

METHODOLOGY

This standard-based audit was conducted at the clinics of undergraduate dental school. A total of 506 intraoral periapical radiographs taken by dental students were graded, according to the standards set by Health Protection Agency, by two evaluators after the necessary calibration to reduce the inter-evaluator differences. In addition to the grading of radiographs, the documentation of errors like coning off, foreshortening/elongation, contact overlap, poor contrast, and image blurring was done. The data analysis was carried out with Microsoft excel software by utilising simple descriptive statistics.

RESULTS

Out of the 506 digital periapical radiographs, 231 (45.7%) radiographs were categorised as Grade 1, 190 (37.6%) radiographs were categorised as Grade 2, and 85 (16.7%) radiographs were categorised as Grade 3, requiring a repeat radiograph; and were diagnostically unacceptable. Considering the aforementioned results, the findings of the first cycle fell short of the required standards.

CONCLUSION

According to the results of the quality assurance audit, the radiographs were below the standards set by the Health Protection Agency. Recommendations were made for improvement measures in the radiology department, and re-audit was planned after one year. Key Words: Quality assurance, ALARA, Radiation protection, Audit, Digital dental radiography.