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If you have ever viewed a picture on a computer screen you have used digital image management. In the dental office image management can be anything from simply viewing a patient photo to enhancing a digital radiograph with advanced diagnostic software. In its simplest form image management is like an electronic photo album. It allows you to capture store retrieve and display an image. However unlike a paper photo album with digital image management you can do two additional things. That is transmit and most importantly enhance the image.

We mentally distinguish between two image types, x-rays and photos (visible light). However in many ways they is really no difference as far as the computer is concerned. Just as a 35mm color slide and an x-ray transparency are different versions of the same photographic technology a digital color image and a digital x-ray are different versions of the same digital technology. The primary difference is in how the image is acquired, yet once it is digitized the computer software needed to work with an x-ray or visible light image is really the same.