[A method of estimating doses in digital luminescent radiography]

Digital storage phosphor radiography can produce images of a constant optical density over a wide range of exposure dose by adjusting reading sensitivity. Since overexposed images are not as readily recognized as with the conventional film-screen technique, a formula was designed, which calculates the radiation dose in the film plane from image sensitivity (S factor), latitude (L factor) and average grey value of the region of interest. To verify the formula, 168 measurements with variation of dose, kVp, L factor, S factor and the readout algorithm were performed using the DIGISCAN storage phosphor system (Siemens). The experiments confirmed the validity of the formula for an S factor of below 5000 (values during routine use 50-400). Correlation between dosimetrically measured radiation dose and the calculated dose was 0.997.