Assessment of Gender Differences in Temporal Bone Anatomy Using Computerized Tomography Scan Images in Iranian People

The skull is one of the most important parts of the body used to determine gender in forensic medicine. Previous studies have focused on cadavers’ skulls in races other than Aryan race. However, the aim of this study was to focus only on temporal bone of living people in our country and evaluate the metric differences between the two sexes. In this is a cross-sectional descriptive analytical study, CT images of patients in Amir Aalam Hospital were selected by the quota-convenience sampling method during 2015-2017. Temporal bone metric indices were calculated and compared in two groups of men and women. The results showed a significant difference in lateral angle of internal acoustic canal, length of mastoid process and the length to width ratio of mastoid process between women and men. But the width of mastoid process, bone thickness and Hounsfield units of squamous part of temporal bone and the angle between squamous part and zygomatic process of temporal bone showed no significant difference between the two groups (men and women). The findings of this study show that certain characteristics of temporal bone alongside other clues can be useful in sex determination. Furthermore, it has emphasized the importance of sexual dimorphism in human anatomy.