Fetal femur length as a predictor of menstrual age: sonographically measured

Radiographic fetal osteometry: Approach on age estimation for the portuguese population

“…In the studied sample, longitudinal dimensions of the diaphysis of long bones are not significantly different between males and females (Femur: Student's t = 1.533; df = 98; p = 0.129; Tibia: Student's t = 1.698; df = 97; p = 0.093; Humerus: Student's t = 1.565; df = 98; p = 0.121). As expected [8][9][10][11][12][13], there is a very strong positive correlation between longitudinal length in the studied bones and documented GA. The correlation between the femur length and GA was the strongest (Pearson's r = 0.969; p = 0.000, see Fig.…”

“…The GA had to be converted to weeks, in order to compare the results obtained with the other three equations. Only the femur was compared since this bone is more closely related to fetal length and GA [3,9,13,18,19]. In order to avoid methodological bias, fifteen fetuses of known gestation age not included in the original regression analysis were used to evaluate which formula is the most reliable to estimate GA in Portuguese fetal remains.…”

“…2). The calculation of GA was made in weeks, following the standard terminology used in obstetrics [9][10][11] and forensic sciences [7]. Classical formulae calculate GA in lunar months [8,13].…”

“…However, it can be of important forensic value, particularly when it is necessary to determine the fetus viability, or in other words, if the fetus could have been born alive [3][4][5][6][7], even knowing that the skeleton alone will not convey the information about whether the fetus was born alive or dead, unless it is regarding neonate's remains [1][2][3]. The two main criteria used for fetal age estimation are dental mineralization and skeletal data, such as long bone diaphyseal length [1,3,6], which is highly correlated with gestational age [8][9][10][11][12][13] and quite resistant to decomposition when comparing with other fetal structures [2,3,5,8]. Although dental age is recognized as more reliable than skeletal age, in many forensic instances the human remains do not include dentition.…”

“…Yet, the lack of large identified skeletal collections including fetuses precludes the existence of appropriate formulae [8]. Consequently, these tables are mostly based on ultrasonographic measurements [9][10][11][12] that might differ from actual measurements on dry bone [17,18]. Moreover, formulae applicable on dry bones have twosteps and are mostly supported by outdated literature [8,13].…”