Serum alkaline phosphatase activity and skeletal maturation in Guatemalan adolescents

Age estimation in the living: A scoping review of population data for skeletal and dental methods

Age estimation of living individuals has become a crucial part of the forensic practice, especially due to the global increase in cross-border migration. The low rate of birth registration in many countries, hence of identification documents of migrants, especially in Africa and Asia, highlights the importance of reliable methods for age estimation of living individuals. Despite the fact that a number of skeletal and dental methods for age estimation have been developed, their main limitation is that they are based on specific reference samples and there is still no consensus among researchers on whether these methods can be applied to all populations. Though this issue remains still unsolved, population information at a glance could be useful for forensic practitioners dealing with such issues. This study aims at presenting a scoping review and mapping of the current situation concerning population data for skeletal (hand-wrist and clavicle) and dental methods (teeth eruption and third molar formation) for age estimation in the living. Two hundred studies on the rate of skeletal maturation and four hundred thirty-nine on the rate of dental maturation were found, covering the period from 1952 and 2020 for a total of ninety-eight countries. For most of the western and central African countries there are currently no data on the rate of skeletal and dental maturation. The same applies to the countries of the Middle East, as well as the eastern European countries, especially as regard the skeletal development.

Accuracy of three age determination X-ray methods on the left hand-wrist: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Age estimation of living individuals often represents a forensic challenge with important legal and social implications. In an effort to better understand the accuracy of the methods of Greulich and Pyle (GP), Tanner-Whitehouse (TW) and Fels, a systematic review and a meta-analysis of articles published from 1956 to 20 December 2009 in the Medline and Trip databases were conducted. We only selected articles on healthy people. The meta-analysis showed that GP is not as accurate a method as TW2 or TW3 for both Caucasian people and Mongoloids, even if it is the one most often used. However, due to the very wide age estimation range, in line with what has already been established by several authors, our systematic review and meta-analysis confirmed that age estimation in living individuals cannot be considered accurate when only X-ray methods on the left hand-wrist are used, but exhaustive combinations of various procedures (i.e. physical examination, dental and skeletal methods) must also be used, as proposed and already applied by the International Study Group on Forensic Age Estimation.