title: [Ultrasound transmission velocity in the patella of normal subjects and in patients with postmenopausal osteoporosis].
abstract: Recently, ultrasound transmission velocity (UTV) has been used to assess skeletal status. The basic principle of UTV measurement of bone is that the speed at which ultrasounds propagate in bone is determined by the mass density and by the index of elasticity, which is intimately correlated with bone strength. Theoretically UTV should provide more information about bone fragility than the absorptiometric techniques of measurement of bone mass. To test this hypothesis, UTV was measured using the SIGNET(TM) (Osteo Technology, Framingham, MA, USA) in the patella of 79 postmenopausal nonobese women. The subjects were divided into 2 groups: 29 postmenopausal normal women (NPM) and 50 patients with at least one vertebral crush fracture due to postmenopausal osteoporosis (PMO). Besides UTV measurements in all subjects lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) was measured by dual energy Rx (Hologic QDR 1000). UTV in NPM (mean age 57.9 +/- 8 SD years) averaged 1867 +/- 62 m/sec, and in PMO (mean age 63.5 +/- 7.8 SD years) averaged 1771 +/- 74 m/sec. It follows that the difference between the two groups was about 96 m/sec. UTV correlated significantly with BMD measured in the lumbar spine (r = 0.51; p less than 0.001), giving a discrimination power virtually identical to that obtained by using spine BMD values. This preliminary data are promising for the use of this new technique which offers a simple, noninvasive measure of bone quality without the limitation of radiation exposure.
authors.affiliation: Istituto di Patologia Speciale Medica, Università degli Studi di Siena.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Agnusdei
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Camporeale
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Gennari
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D015519:Bone Density; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008159:Lumbar Vertebrae; D008875:Middle Aged; D015663:Osteoporosis, Postmenopausal / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D010329:Patella / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D012016:Reference Values; D014463:Ultrasonography
vernacular_title: La velocità di trasmissione degli ultrasuoni nella patella in soggetti normali ed in pazienti con osteoporosi postmenopausale.