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The office charges $90 for a cleaning, an exam and bitewing X-rays — about half the national average fee and a third of what many big-city dentists would charge for the same services.

My colleague Aaron Carroll and I have recently written Upshot articles questioning the need for annual bitewing X-rays for some patients and the efficacy of other dental practices.

“Would you like bitewing X-rays? It’s been a year since your last ones. Your insurance will cover them annually.”

If there are no spaces between the teeth, bitewing X-rays of the rear teeth should be taken at the initial examination.

The researchers found that people who had had a meningioma were more than twice as likely as those who had not to have had at least one bitewing X-ray.