Quantitative assessment of osteoporosis from the tibia shaft by ultrasound techniques.
Bone mineral density (BMD) is used as a clinical estimate of the risk of fracture. Ultrasound provides an alternative or complement to X-ray based methods of bone densitometry for determining BMD. Among ultrasonic characteristics, the speed of sound (SOS) is a useful tool for assessment of osteoporosis because, as recently reported, it represents a combination of density and compressibility of bone tissue. Thus, it might provide better information on bone quality to estimate the fracture risk. In this paper, a dual-transducer ultrasound technique was employed to measure the mean ultrasound propagation speed of the cortical layer as well as the cancellous layer at the tibia shaft. Encouraging results from 18 outpatients showed a high correlation (r = 0.93) between measurements of BMD and those from dual energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA).
Chen
Tainsong
T
Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Cheng-Kung UniversityTainan 70101,Taiwan. chenta@mail.bme.ncku.edu.tw
Chen
Pei-Jarn
PJ
Fung
Chia-Shiung
CS
Lin
Chi-Jeng
CJ
Yao
Wei-Jen
WJ
D015502:Absorptiometry, Photon; D000368:Aged; D015519:Bone Density; D003720:Densitometry / Q000379:methods*; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010024:Osteoporosis / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000503:physiopathology; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D013977:Tibia / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000528:radiation effects / Q000648:ultrastructure*; D014159:Transducers; D014463:Ultrasonography / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods*