Anatomo-radiological importance and the incidence of os odontoideum in Turkish subjects: a retrospective study.

PURPOSE: Os odontoideum is a rare anatomical and morphological variation of the odontoid process and associated with a range of symptoms such as spinal cord and vertebral artery injuries. This study aimed to evaluate the frequency of os odontoideum in Turkish cases by sagittal/coronal cervical magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography (CT) and analyze the relationship with age, gender and related symptoms. METHODS: The incidence of os odontoideum was retrospectively diagnosed by sagittal/coronal cervical CT and MRI out of 16,122 subjects aged 20-70 years (mean 46) in the period between 2014 and 2018. The relationship of os odontoideum with age, gender, and symptoms was recorded. RESULTS: The statistical analysis of the study was performed by the χ² test and two-way mixed ANOVA. Os odontoideum was detected in 18 (0.11%) (11 males; 7 females) out of 16,122 patients. The mean age was 47.5 ± 1.4 years in the females and 43.5 ± 2.5 years in the males (p < 0.05). 6 odontoideum were detected out of 6467 (3756 males, mean 48 ± 0.7, 2711 females, mean 46 ± 1.2) subjects by CT and 12 odontoideum were detected out of 9655 patients (5607 males and 4048 females) by MRI. CONCLUSION: Neck pain was the most frequent symptom. The prevalence of os odontoideum especially round type is more frequent in older male patients over 40 years old with head and neck pain or atlantoaxial instability, and is less common in Turkish subjects when compared to various ethnic groups.

Prevalence and distribution of the fabella: a radiographic study in Turkish subjects.

BACKGROUND: The purpose of this study is to examine the plain knee radiographs in Turkish subjects in order to determine the prevalence of the fabella and analyse the differences between age, gender, laterality and its symmetry pattern. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Bilateral antero-posterior and lateral knee radiographs of 500 patients (250 male and 250 female subjects, 1000 knee radiographs) were randomly selected from the clinical database and retrospectively evaluated. Data on patient age, gender, and knee laterality (right-left) were evaluated from hospital records. The differences between the sesamoid bones at a particular location and the side, sex and age groups were analysed. RESULTS: The overall prevalence of the fabella (unilateral or bilateral) was 22.8% (114 subjects). The fabella was present unilaterally in 38 (7.6%) subjects, while it was present bilaterally in 76 (15.2%) subjects. The prevalence of the fabella was similar between the body sides. The prevalence of the fabella was also similar between genders (unilateral or bilateral cases) and age groups. CONCLUSIONS: We examined the prevalence, symmetry pattern, age and gender differences in Turkish population. It is the first study performed on Turkish population with the largest sample in current literature. Prevalence of fabella is found to be 22.8% which is quite similar with other Caucasian ethnic populations.

Effect of sitting, standing, and supine body positions on facial soft tissue: detailed 3D analysis.

Medical imaging techniques require various body positions. Gravity causes changes in the facial soft tissue and acts in different directions according to the position of the head during imaging. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of positional changes on the facial soft tissue. The faces of subjects were scanned in the standing, sitting, and supine body positions. Differences in the positions were compared using the root mean square (RMS), mean absolute deviation (MAD), and mean signed distance (MSD). The displacement of 15 midsagittal and 20 bilateral landmarks was evaluated. The RMS, MAD, and MSD values of the sitting-standing comparison were significantly lower than those of the sitting-supine and standing-supine comparisons. There were no significant differences between the sitting-supine and standing-supine comparisons. Sixteen out of 135 measurements (12%) of the midsagittal landmarks and 94 out of 180 (52%) measurements of the bilateral landmarks showed significant displacements among the body positions. These results demonstrate a significant change in the facial soft tissue caused by body position. Furthermore, these data show the different susceptibilities of the facial soft tissue landmarks to the effect of body position along the x, y, and z axes.