The history of dental radiology in Turkey

Abstract

Reflections of the invention of W.C. Roentgen reached Turkey in a very short period of time. In the field of medicine, Captain Dr. Esat Feyzi and Captain Dr. Rifat Osman were the first who utilized X-rays in Turkey. Just after the invention of X-rays, the first intraoral radiograms were obtained by Otto Walkhoff and Wilhelm Koenig in Germany and by Frank Harrison in England. The first dental radiology department in Turkey was founded in the Istanbul Darülfünunu Dişçi Mektebi (Istanbul University Faculty of Dentistry) in 1927. Also, dental radiology education started at that time. The first book about radiology was written in 1928, which also was contained information about dental radiology. The first dentist whose profession was radiology was Galip Abdi Rona in Turkey. Rona also presented a paper and made radiology presentations in the first Turkish dental congress between 1 and 5 November 1932. In the beginning of the 1980s, radiology became an independent dental department. Today, in Turkey, there are about 45 dentistry faculties who have radiology departments. A lot of state-of-the-art devices are used not only in faculties but also in private clinics.

Keywords

• Dentistry
• history
• radiology
• Turkey