Conventional tomography and computed tomography-are both methods necessary for evaluation of facial lesions?

108 patients with verified traumatic, inflammatory and neoplastic lesions in the facial region and the pharyngeal space were evaluated both with conventional tomography and CT. Subsequently an analysis was made as to whether both methods were complementary or at least partially replaceable by each other. In traumatic lesions transverse axial CT combined with frontal tomography yielded optimal information. For the diagnosis of inflammatory and neoplastic lesions CT was superior to tomography with the exception of lateral tomograms which contributed additional information to diseases of the sphenoid sinus, the epipharynx, the pterygopalatine fossa and the orbital roof. The radiation dose to the eye is remarkably lower in CT than in tomography.