CPD Resources for Radiographers

Welcome to the Radiographers CPD resources page. Listed below are some articles and websites that might be of interest, and could be used for self-directed CPD. If you have come across any material which might be useful to others, please send me a reference or link so we can include it on this page.
Liz Burley

e-LfH:  http://www.e-lfh.org.uk

e-LfH is a Department of Health Programme in partnership with the NHS and Professional Bodies providing high quality content free of charge for the training of the NHS workforce across the UK. e-LfH e-learning is free to all relevant healthcare professionals within the NHS; the sessions you can access depend on your specialty, organised through your professional body. N.B. It takes up to 48 hours to register and gain access, as all applicants are vetted, so best to apply before you want to study.

e-Den:   http://www.e-lfh.org.uk/projects/dentistry

Part of the e Learning for Healthcare (e-LfH) initiative. This is a great resource for those new to the field of dental health. To access e-den directly, you need to be registered with the GDC. However, radiographers working in the NHS can register with e-LfH http://www.e-lfh.org.uk using your NHS email address. This gives you free access to modules approved by the College of Radiographers. You should then request e-Den as one of your learning options. (Another good option is the SOR Image Interpretation section, which delivers tutorials suitable for commenting and reporting radiographers.) The dental radiography section is a good introduction to the basics of image acquisition and interpretation: in e-Den, select Module 1: Assessment Methods and Techniques. The Radiology sections are 01-02-016 to 01-02-021. e-Den modules 1-9 cover most of the topics taught to undergraduates in dental schools and are a vast resource for those wishing to learn more about the field of dentistry and dental health in general.

SedentexCT:  http://www.sedentexct.eu

The SEDENTEXCT project (1 January 2008 – 30 June 2011) focused on enhanced safety and efficacy in the use of Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) in dental and maxillofacial radiology. Their guidelines are now published as Radiation Protection 172 and are available on this website. Also of interest are sections covering; the science of CBCT, forums, training tools and links to journal articles on CBCT.

Journal Articles:   

HPA-CRCE-043 - Trends in Dental Radiography Equipment and Patient Dose in the UK and Republic of Ireland

A review of data collected by the HPA Dental X-Ray Protection Services between 2008 and 2011 for intra-oral and panoramic X-ray equipment.

This review shows that since the 2007 review, patient doses have continued to decrease in intra-oral radiography, due in part to X-ray sets operating below 50 kVp becoming obsolete and the significant decrease in the use of speed group D films. The anticipated dose savings from using digital imaging are yet to be fully realised as many practices are either not selecting appropriate exposure settings on their X-ray equipment or their equipment cannot fully exploit the dose savings of digital imaging due to the unavailability of sufficiently low exposure settings. For panoramic radiography, the patient dose measurements included in this review indicate that average patient doses have not decreased. The increased use of digital imaging systems does not appear to have had a significant effect on patient doses at present. However, the newer generation of digital systems which utilise very short exposure times may lead to reductions in doses over the next few years if more of these systems are introduced into dental practices.