Orthoscope-digital images in dentistry and dermatology

The classical method of visual documentation is photography. It requires a long processing time and it is relatively expensive. Its advantage is high quality compared to standard TV images. However, photographs cannot be stored and administered by computers unless they are digitized, which brings additional costs. So-called electronic mirrors are currently spreading in dentistry. They usually capture images in the mouth using an endoscope and TV technology. Electronic mirrors are expensive and offer fish-eye views of the scene, which is good for a human observer but not for geometrical measurement or comparison. Dentists usually document the status of teeth by partially formalized verbal descriptions. Dermatologists also describe blobs on the skin verbally, and accompany this description by hand-drawings and measurements of blob perimeters. The description is usually written by an assistant to whom the physician dictates; this is labor-intensive. The visual appearance is, apart from anamnesis, the only source of information. From the verbal description, it is difficult to get a good notion of what the original situation looked like. This paper suggests that an image can replace the verbal description of the visual appearance completely