COMPARISON OF CANINE FEMORAL TORSION MEASUREMENTS USING A THREE-DIMENSIONAL AXIAL AND SAGITTAL METHOD, TWO DISTINCT TRANSVERSE METHODS, AND COMPUTED TOMOGRAPHY VOLUMETRIC RECONSTRUCTIONS

• Grant number: 24/23900-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: August 01, 2025
• End date: July 31, 2028
• Field of knowledge: Agronomical Sciences - Veterinary Medicine - Animal Clinics and Surgery
• Principal Investigator: Bruno Watanabe Minto
• Grantee: Angélica Barreto Leite Tavares
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências Agrárias e Veterinárias (FCAV). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Jaboticabal. Jaboticabal , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Patellar luxation is a syndrome in which bone deformities of the tibia and femur have a direct etiological and pathophysiological correlation. The methods for assessing femoral torsion by subjective frontal and sagittal plane radiography and measurement by computed tomography from the transverse plane from distal to proximal have been standardized. However, there is still controversy about the reference standard for these measurements and how three-dimensional methods could increase the accuracy of these other methods. In this sense, the present study aims to comparatively evaluate 6 different methods for assessing femoral torsion in 110 dogs with patellar luxation. Three different evaluators will compare the tomographic evaluation method using the transverse plane from distal to proximal, the tomographic evaluation method using the transverse plane from proximal to distal, the tomographic method using the median created from the sagittal and frontal planes, the subjective methods using the sagittal plane based on the relationship between the axis of the femoral head and the acetabulum, and three-dimensional reconstruction to assess the measurements of the transverse plane from distal to proximal and from proximal to distal. The tomographies will be evaluated based on the images obtained from the sagittal, frontal, and transverse planes of the femur, which will have a bone alignment based on the alignment of the axes in order to provide a view of the femoral head and neck in all images to be evaluated. The three-dimensional prints will be positioned in axial mode to obtain the transverse plane so that the measurements can be performed on these stereolithographic bone models. The evaluations will be made by comparing the measurements of the 6 methods and 3 evaluators in order to define which would be the most reliable and precise way to define femoral torsion through the anteversion angle of the femoral head and neck. The results will be analyzed by statistical and comparative methods in order to evaluate the degree of discrepancy between the evaluation of the tomographic methods and three-dimensional printing models and whether there is any variance in results among the six methods studied.