ESPE Abstracts

Background: The growth process that transforms a newborn into an adult implies that there is not only an increase in height but above all a constant change in body proportions. Knowledge of the body proportions gives insight into the natural process of maturation and any disturbance can be used as a diagnostic tool.

Objective and hypotheses: Manual measurement of body dimensions is a highly time-consuming procedure requiring a variety of measurement tools. Therefore, photometry as an alternative method is developed that allow a much faster measurement of body dimensions.

Method: The main procedure involves taking both frontal and lateral digital pictures of the subject, transferring the pictures to the photometry software and using a mouse device to select up to ten anatomical points in the images. A reference object on the photograph is used in order to determine the correspondence between pixels in the image and real centimetres.

Results: Comparison of the manual taken measurements and the results of photometry shows a good correlation between both methods provided standardized photography setup is used. All measurements are expressed in centimetres and SDS based on the reference of the atlas ‘Paediatric Morphometrics’.

Conclusion: The main advantages of the photometry method are speed and ease of use. Taking pictures using a digital camera and transferring them to a computer running the photometry software can be done relatively fast. Within a few minutes one is informed about ten measurements, which will take about 15 min otherwise.