physics war story

[Chris Alston <alstonc@odrge.odr.georgetown.edu>]

>From: David Findley <david@REYES.STANFORD.EDU>
>
>Many years ago, when I was just starting as a postdoctoral fellow at UCLA,
>I had to visit an endodontist for a root canal treatment. Hearing that I
>worked in a Radiology department, he began to complain that one of his two
>x-ray machines gave poor results. He was using his wife-receptionist as his
>phantom but was unable to come up with a good technique after many
>exposures. I volunteered to help him as a public service to spare his wife
>the radiation dose. I borrowed a head phantom from a dental radiologist and
>came to my next appointment ready to get down to work. I ask him what
>technique he was using and where he got it. He said that he was using the
>same technique on both machines and that he got it from the film box. I
>took a look and discovered that he was using the long-cone technique on his
>short-cone machine. Doing physics is more fun than getting a root canal done.
>David O. Findley, Ph.D.
>Stanford Hospital and Clinics
>Department of Radiation Oncology
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