Building a digital atlas from a normal hand image database

Bone age assessment is a procedure frequently performed in pediatric patients to evaluate their growth disorder. A commonly used method is by atlas matching with a small reference set of Greulich-Pyle atlas that was developed in 1950s based on middle class white populations. The old Greulich-Pyle atlas is not fully applicable for today's children especially regarding the standard development in other racial groups. We have collected over 1000 hand and wrist images for normal boys and girls of Caucasian, African, Hispanic and Asian descents from newborn to 18 years of age. In this paper we present an atlasing method that will automatically select the reference images from the normal collection data-base to form a digital atlas. Compared with the book-based Greulich-Pyle atlas, the digital atlas is easy to access and can always be replenished with new images reflecting more accurately the current population and skeletal development.