Sex determination by talus: A comparative study

Abstract

Heel bone of Horses was used by the soldiers as dice; hence the heel bone became called Taxillus means 'die'. The articular morphology of the human skeleton is subject to modifications by stresses imposed upon it. Since it is a weight-bearing bone, sexual dimorphic features ensure the correct identification of sex in optimum situations when the entire skeleton is present and well preserved and is from a known population, the totality of sexually dimorphic features ensures the correct identification of sex. However, the optimum situation is all too rare. Hence this study aims at the identification of the sex of an unknown skeleton. Materials and Methods:The materials for the present study consisted of 96 humans dry Tali of unknown age and sex obtained from the Department of Anatomy, Kasturba Medical College, Centre of basic Sciences, Bejai, Mangalore and on X-Rays of 96 healthy normal subjects whose age and sex are known who were referred as patients within the data collection period to the Department of Radiology, Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore. Results: The right-sided talus exhibited higher dimensions compared to the rest. By the demarcating point method, only a very few Tali were sexed correctly, 14.58% (14) in dry talus. Conclusion:The study provides indications that talus forms one of the important Bone for diagnosis of sex and could be effectively used as an alternative in forensic cases.