Identification of sex in Iranian population using patella dimensions.

Objectives: Heretofore, sex determination has been carried out on skeletal remains to identify individuals in forensic cases and to assess populations in archaeological cases. Since it has been shown that not all bones are found in a forensic case, discriminant function equations should be derived for various bones of the body to assist in sex determination. The aim of this study was to derive discriminant function equations for sex determination from measurements of the patella.

Methods: In a prospective study, dimensions of patella were measured using the fresh cadavers of Iranian population as referred to the Tehran's Legal Medicine Organization.

Results: A total sample of 113 (57 male, 56 female) patellae were measured using three measurements. Stepwise and direct analyses were performed with the average accuracy of 92.9% for sex classification, thereby making the patella useful for sex determination.

Conclusions: The results of this study confirm the high accuracy of using the measurement of the patella for sex determination. Until further data collected suggests otherwise, the results expected in present study are limited to forensic cases of the Iranian population.