Diagnostic quality of multiplanar reformations obtained with a newly developed cone beam device for maxillofacial imaging

Objectives: To compare the diagnostic quality of multiplanar reformations generated by a newly developed cone beam device with the diagnostic quality of multiplanar reformations obtained using a state of the art multidetector row CT scanner. Methods: Digital volume tomograms (DVTs) were obtained with the prototype of GALILEOS (Sirona Dental Systems Inc., Bensheim, Germany), a newly developed compact-sized cone beam machine with a scan volume of 15×15×15 cm. CT scans were performed for comparison with two 16-detector row CT scanners. The study included 30 image pairs obtained from the same patients. The multiplanar reformations in axial, coronal and sagittal planes were subjectively assessed by 3 observers using a 1(excellent)–5(poor) scale on 35 weighted criteria including findings detection, image quality and visualization of several anatomical structures. Results: There was no statistically significant difference between DVT and CT in cumulative values expressing the diagnostic quality of the reformatio...