Establishment of Cervical Vertebral Bone Age Based on Pattern Matching Method

本研究的目的是建立一个“颈椎骨龄”(VA)作为成熟度指标，并设计一个用VA预测下颌骨发育的公式。首先，使用200张7~15岁女性的头影测量片，测量了3、4颈椎的8个参数。利用这些参数的比例测量值，采用多元回归公式计算VA。公式为：椎体前高(AH)/椎体前后长(AP)9.63×4/APNext，用另一组资料(8~13岁女性66例)对该公式的可靠性进行评估。手腕X线片的VA与骨龄(Tanner-Whitehouse 2法)的相关系数高于VA与年龄的相关系数。相关系数差异有统计学意义(p&lt；0.05)。Va被发现是有用的生理年龄指标。第三，对下颌发育的预测进行了检验。对21名女性在初诊时(7~12岁)和末诊时(17岁以上)测量下颌骨长度(Cd-Gn)，并在初诊时计算VA。公式如下：下颌骨生长潜力=-2.63 36.85×VALASTe，初步探讨了基于手腕X线片的骨龄自动估测方法。采用模式匹配法。证实了该方法可以应用于VA。

The purpose of this study was to establish a "cervical vertebrae bone age" (VA) as maturity indicator and design a formula to predict mandibular growth using VA.First, using 200 cephalometric radiographs for females between 7 and 15 years of age, the eight parameters on third and forth cervical vertebrae of cephalometric radiographs were measured. Multiple regression formula was used to calculate VA by using the proportional measurements of these parameters. The formula was as follows : VA=0.80+6.05×3^<rd> vertebral anterior height (AH)/antero-posterior length (AP)+9.63×4^<th> vertebral AH/APNext, by using another set of materials (66 females between 8 and 13 years of age), the reliability of this formula was estimated. Correlation coefficient between VA and bone age (Tanner-Whitehouse 2 method) using hand wrist X-ray films was higher than the correlation between VA and chronological age. Difference of these correlation coefficients was significant (p<0.05). VA was found to be useful as physiological age indication.Third, prediction of mandibular growth was examined. The mandibular length (Cd-Gn) of 21 females were measured on both initial examination (7-12 years of age) and last examination (over 17 years), and VA was calculated on initial examination. The formula was as follows : Growth potential of the mandible=-2.63+36.85×VALastly, automatic estimation of skeletal age based on hand-wrist radiographs was examined as the preliminary study. The pattern matching method was applied. It was confirmed that this method could be applied to VA.