Use of Frontal Sinus and Nasal Septum Pattern as an Aid in Personal Identification and Determination of Gender: A Radiographic Study.

INTRODUCTION: Personal identification and gender determination of unknown person has a vital importance in forensic investigation. Human skull radiography is a useful tool in human identification in natural disaster, in any accidents such as fire accident and road traffic accident where body remains become degraded or severely destroyed.

AIM: Present study was performed to evaluate the measurement of frontal sinus, uniqueness of various pattern of nasal septum when combined with frontal sinus observed on posterio anterior cephalogram for sex determination as well as personal identification.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 80 individuals, 40 males and 40 females, between the age ranges of 18-30 years were selected. The selected individuals had their Posterio Anterior (PA) cephalogram performed after taking their informed consent. Right and left areas and the maximum height and width of the frontal sinus were determined and septum patterns were evaluated and both patterns were also combined and compared. The radiographs were taken on Xtropan 2000 OPG X-ray machine with cephalography attachment and KODAK CR 7400 digital radiography system. Mean and SD values of the greatest height and width of frontal sinus in male and female patients were thus evaluated. The mean values of the frontal sinus were greater in males and the left area was larger than the right area, based on student's t-test at the 5% level of significance.

RESULTS: The combination of Frontal Sinus Patterns and Nasal Septum Patterns (FP+NSP) were assessed and found that there were nine classifiable patterns in 26 (32.5%) individuals (12 males and 14 females), each of which had common representations in more than one individual. Besides these patterns, there were unique unclassifiable patterns in 54 (67.5%) individuals.

CONCLUSION: The present study supports the use of radiographic evaluation of frontal sinus dimensions, frontal sinus patterns, nasal septum deviations and the combination FP+NSP patterns for personal identification and gender determination in forensic investigations.