Analysis of time of closure of the spheno-occipital synchondrosis using computed tomography

Ontogeny of the spheno‐occipital synchondrosis in a modern Queensland, Australian population using computed tomography

“…The sample age range was selected based on previous literature reports using MSCT in Australian children, demonstrating complete fusion of the spheno-occipital synchondrosis over the age of 17 years of age in Victorian individuals (Bassed et al, 2010) and 17.9 years and 15.5 years in Western Australian males and females, respectively (Franklin and Flavel, 2014). The database is comprised of de-identified retrospective cranial DICOM data obtained from patients admitted for clinical evaluation between 2007 and 2014 at the Departments of Medical Imaging at The Royal Children's Hospital (RCH; Toshiba Aquilion TSX-101A CT, Toshiba Medical Systems, Tochigi, Japan; voxel size: 0.391 3 0.391 3 0.30) and The Mater Health Services (Philips Brilliance 64 CT, Philips Medical Systems, Cleveland; voxel size: 0.363 3 0.363 3 0.45), Brisbane, Australia.…”

“…Computed tomography (CT) imaging has been implemented in contemporary research to examine closure of the spheno-occipital synchondrosis as it offers improved visualization quality (Okamoto et al, 1996;Sahni et al, 1998;El-Sheikh and Ramadan, 2006;Bassed et al, 2010). Recently, closure of the spheno-occipital synchondrosis in Australian individuals has been investigated specific for the geographic states of Victoria (Victorian Institute of Medicine; Bassed et al, 2010), demonstrating complete closure by the age of 17 years irrespective of sex; and Western Australia (Franklin and Flavel, 2014) who utilized prediction intervals derived from transition analysis to document complete fusion of the synchondrosis in all males over 19.3 years of age and females over 16.3 years.…”

“…Recently, closure of the spheno-occipital synchondrosis in Australian individuals has been investigated specific for the geographic states of Victoria (Victorian Institute of Medicine; Bassed et al, 2010), demonstrating complete closure by the age of 17 years irrespective of sex; and Western Australia (Franklin and Flavel, 2014) who utilized prediction intervals derived from transition analysis to document complete fusion of the synchondrosis in all males over 19.3 years of age and females over 16.3 years. Variance in stage-based scoring systems to assess the fusion status is evident across CT-specific studies in the literature (Table 1); ranging from two stages in Arabian Gulf (El-Sheikh and Ramadan, 2006) and Saudi Arabian (Lingawi, 2012) individuals; three and four stages in Australian East (Bassed et al, 2010) and West Coast populations (Franklin and Flavel, 2014); to a five-stage system by Madeline and Elster (1995) on a United States sample.…”

“…As evidenced in Table 1, documented age-at-fusion of this basicranial synchondrosis is still highly variable in CT studies (Table 1), therefore an assessment specific to the Queensland population is warranted to (i) assess the degree of interstate variation in skeletal maturity, with reference to the recent Victorian (Bassed et al, 2010) and Western Australian (Franklin and Flavel, 2014) studies and (ii) recalibrate age parameters for our Queensland population using an alternative Bayesian statistical approach (Langley-Shirley and Jantz, 2011). While an abundance of studies have provided valuable documentation of skeletal growth variation between populations (Garn and Clark, 1976;Rikhasor et al, 1999;Schaefer and Black, 2005), little is known of the degree and causes of intrapopulation variation, which may provide insight into complex patterns of ontogenetic allometric variability within a particular population (Pinhasi et al, 2011).…”

Posterior cranial base natural growth and development: A systematic review

“…9 The spheno-occipital synchondrosis connects the occipital and sphenoid bones and is located anterior and superior to the foramen magnum and below the pituitary fossa. 10 To date, there are numerous reports that have studied growth of S-Ba and the spheno-occipital synchondrosis, [11][12][13][14] but there is no certainty as for when it completes its fusion and consequently stops growing.…”