Radio-anatomical examination of sex determination between the distance of Transverse Foramens at First Cervical Vertebra

Determination of sex using skeletal bones is important for sciences like anatomy, forensic medicine, archeology, anthropology and pathology. The aim of this study is to contribute to this issue by using a different method to determine whether first cervical vertebra, which is one of the best known bones in columna vertebralis, can be used in sex determination or not. A total of 284 cases were examined in this study in which cases were 200 neck CT examinations (100 women and 100 men) and 84 cases were dry atlas bones. First of all, 6 parameters were used while measuring the distance between both medial and lateral edge of the transverse foramen (FTM, FTL) which belongs to adult men?s and women?s CT images. Then by taking the averages of them, 2 more other parameters (FTMORT ? FTLORT) were obtained. According to this, FTMORT is 4.92 cm (±0.34) for men and 4.52 cm (±0.28) for women, while FTLORT is 6.24 cm (±0.38) for men and 5.70 cm (±0.29) for women. By examining these parameters using ROC analysis, it was found that, the cut-off value of FTMORT is 4.64 cm and the cut-off value of FTLORT is 5.92 cm. The accuracy of sex determination in CT images by FTMORT cut-off was 76% while it was 80% for FTLORT. When these data were applied to 84 dry atlas bones whose sex were unknown, it has been anticipated that 49 of them were women, 22 were men and also it was estimated that 11 were children which were below women values. Two bones were excluded from the examination since the parameters could not be measured absolutely. In conclusion, it was assessed that, with the cut-off values found by measuring the distance between both medial and lateral edge of the transverse foramen, sex determination can be made in atlas bones with a 78.8% accuracy in the unknown genders.Keywords: Transverse Foramen, First Cervical Vertebra, Sex Determination, Computed Tomography