Harjeet Kaur, Synghal Sanjeev, Kaur Gagandeep, Aggarwal Anjali, Wahee Pratima
Department of Anatomy, Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh-160012, India.
Leg Med (Tokyo). 2010 Sep;12(5):223-7. doi: 10.1016/j.legalmed.2010.05.001. Epub 2010 Jul 13.
Time of fusion of hyoid is of considerable interest for forensic experts in estimating the age of an individual when unrecognized decomposed bodies or skeletal remains are available. The present investigation was carried out to study the age of fusion in 200 hyoid bones (133 males and 67 females) varying in age from 18 to 85years. Fusion of greater cornu with the body of the hyoid bone was not seen till the age of 25years in both sexes. In the males complete fusion was seen in 22(16.5%) bilaterally and 16(6.0%) unilaterally while in females it was observed in 18(26.9%) bilaterally and 10(7.5%) unilaterally. No significant sexual and side differences were found between the incidence of fusion of greater cornu with the body of hyoid in almost all the age groups except in the last age group (61 & above) where the sexual difference was highly significant (p<0.001) in unilateral complete fusion and in total cases in bilateral complete fusion (p<0.01). The lesser cornu was not fused with the junction or with greater cornu till the age of 35years in males and 40years in females. The maximum incidence of fusion of lesser cornu was observed in last age group of 61years and above (55.6% males and 66.7% females). In conclusion estimation of age by using hyoid bone is not reliable as time of fusion of greater cornu with the body of hyoid is irregular. Subjects above the age of 60 years had either unilateral (13.2%) or bilateral (42.1%) nonfusion or also fusion (21.1% bilateral, 13.2% unilateral). The present method can be a supplementary approach for estimating age when the other skeletal remains are not available.
当面对身份不明的腐败尸体或骨骼遗骸时，舌骨融合时间对于法医专家估算个体年龄具有重要意义。本研究旨在对200块年龄在18至85岁之间的舌骨（133例男性和67例女性）进行融合年龄的研究。在25岁之前，无论男女，舌骨大角与舌骨体均未出现融合。在男性中，双侧完全融合的有22例（16.5%），单侧完全融合的有16例（6.0%）；而在女性中，双侧完全融合的有18例（26.9%），单侧完全融合的有10例（7.5%）。除了最后一个年龄组（61岁及以上），在几乎所有年龄组中，舌骨大角与舌骨体融合发生率的性别和左右侧差异均不显著。在最后一个年龄组中，单侧完全融合的性别差异极为显著（p<0.001），双侧完全融合的总病例中性别差异也显著（p<0.01）。男性在35岁之前、女性在40岁之前，舌骨小角与舌骨体或舌骨大角均未融合。舌骨小角融合发生率最高的是61岁及以上的年龄组（男性为55.6%，女性为66.7%）。总之，由于舌骨大角与舌骨体的融合时间不规律，利用舌骨估算年龄并不可靠。60岁以上的受试者中，单侧（13.2%）或双侧（42.1%）未融合，也有融合情况（双侧21.1%，单侧13.2%）。当无法获得其他骨骼遗骸时，本方法可作为估算年龄的一种补充手段。
