Applications of CBCT in Clinical Dentistry

CBCT technology is being widely used in all fields of dentistry, including orthodontics, endodontics, oral surgery/pathology, periodontics, and implant treatment planning. Depending upon the characteristics of the CBCT machine, such as size of detector and voxel size, different applications may be selected.

Before acquiring a CBCT on a patient, it is very important that the clinician review the medical history, clinical information and previous radiographic images to assess the need for the CBCT images. There must be a risk-benefit balance between any radiation exposures versus the information that may be gained by the study.¹¹ Is the patient going to benefit from the CBCT study? Would the additional information potentially change the diagnosis and/or the treatment planning? A good principle would be to acquire a CBCT study only when, in conjunction with the clinical examination, the benefit to the patient will be higher than the risk to the patient.