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References

Department of Health and Social Care. Face coverings: when to wear one, exemptions and how to make your own. 2020. https://tinyurl.com/28wyr6jp (accessed March 2021)

Letters to the Editor

From Volume 48, Issue 4, April 2021 | Page 328

Authors

Rosemary Potter

BSc (Hons), BDS (Hons), MFDS RCS (Glas)

Dental Core Trainee in Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital

Articles by Rosemary Potter

Article

A new artefact source

I would like to draw the attention of readers to a new artefact source that may start to be seen more regularly. In the current era of the COVID-19 pandemic, the uptake of wearing masks has dramatically increased, and in certain places, it is compulsory to wear one unless there is an exemption.1

Here we see the artefact of the metal wire in a surgical mask on an orthopantomogram (OPG) in a male in his 20s who presented to A&E with bilateral mandibular angle fractures (Figure 1).

Figure 1. An orthopantomogram (OPG) showing a surgical mask wire artefact in a male with bilateral mandibular angle fractures.

This artefact has the potential to cause confusion to the interpreter of the radiograph. With homemade and fashion masks also being available to patients, different artefact patterns may be observed by your readers. Here, I aim to highlight this as a potential artefact source.