Zagzebski J A, Rossman P J, Mesina C, Mazess R B, Madsen E L
University of Wisconsin, Department of Medical Physics, Madison 53706.
Calcif Tissue Int. 1991 Aug;49(2):107-11. doi: 10.1007/BF02565130.
A method of measuring ultrasonic propagation in the os calcis was devised for assessing bone properties in humans. Speed-of-sound (SOS) and broadband ultrasound attenuation (BUA) were measured using broadband acoustic pulses transmitted and received by a pair of focused transducers. The transducers are mounted coaxially in a water tank with the subject's heel in between. Reproducibility of results in an adult male was 10% for the BUA and 1.2% for the SOS. Both SOS and BUA changed when the transmission path through the os calcis was varied. For a population of normal male subjects, SOS and BUA were correlated with densitometry results on the os calcis, but less well correlated to area density at remote sites.
