Measurement Position Influences Sex Comparisons Of Distal Femoral Cartilage Thickness With Ultrasound Imaging
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Knee position during ultrasound imaging may influence cartilage measurements. Knee loading during gait varies by sex and may contribute to regional differences in cartilage features. PURPOSE: The purpose was to examine (1) the effect of measurement position and sex on femoral cartilage outcomes, and (2) the association between gait biomechanics and cartilage outcomes. METHODS: 25 males and 25 females who were matched by age and BMI participated (Females; Age = 20.6 ± 1.8 years, BMI = 23.2 ± 2.8, Males; Age = 20.6 ± 1.7 years, BMI = 23.5 ± 2.6). Ultrasound measured femoral cartilage thickness and echo-intensity (EI) at 90°, 115°, and 140° of knee flexion and was segmented into medial, central, and lateral regions. Gait outcomes included the external knee adduction and knee flexion moments. Cartilage outcomes were compared using 2(sex) x 3(position) repeated measures ANOVA. Gait and cartilage associations were assessed using stepwise regression. RESULTS: There was sex by measurement position interaction effect on medial (F2-96 = 6.11, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.20) and central cartilage thickness (F2-96 = 9.73, p < 0.01, ηp2 = 0.17). Males had thicker medial cartilage at 90° than 115° (p = 0.02) and 140° (p < 0.01) and at 115° than 140° (p < 0.01) and had thicker central cartilage at 90° than 115° (p = 0.01) and 140° (p < 0.01) and at 115° than 140° (p < 0.01), but females only had thicker cartilage in the central region at 90° than at 115° (p < 0.01) and 140° (p < 0.01). Cartilage was thicker at 90° compared with 140° across both sexes within all regions (p < 0.01). Males had thicker cartilage than females in all positions (p < 0.01). EI was lower at 90° than 115° (p < 0.01) and 140° (p = 0.01) in the central region and lower at 90° than 115° (p < 0.01) and 140° (p = 0.03) in the lateral region. No association was found between gait and cartilage outcomes (all p > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Imaging position has a larger effect on cartilage features in males compared with females when measured using ultrasound. To comprehensively evaluate cartilage, 3 positions may be needed for males compared to 2 positions for females. Future study designs should consider males have thicker cartilage than females and joint position influences cartilage thickness and EI. Single step gait biomechanics may be insufficient to establish associations between habitual loading and cartilage features. Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (RGPIN-2022-04804, PI: DN Pamukoff); Western University Strategic Support for NSERC (Proposal ID: 000052849; PI: DN Pamukoff); and Western University Faculty Research Development Fund (Proposal ID: 0000052443; PI: DN Pamukoff).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.002 | 0.007 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".