ABSTRACT

Age assessment has an important place in Forensic Medicine. Estimation of the accurate age is required in some legal proces-ses as demographic records are not properly performed in Tur-key. Age determination by researching the epiphyseal union of some specific joints in the specific age groups is the commonly used method. Most commonly used methods are Greulich-Pyle and Tanner-Whitehouse methods for this purpose Greu-lich- Pyle method is preferred in our country usually because of easy applicability.

According to some recent studies, the rate of growth and de-velopment is quicker and so the maturation occurs earlier. In our study, 570 x-rays of different ages are evaluated to test the correlation of recent methods. We found that the epiphyseal union started at the age of 16, in hand-wrist, shoulder and pelvis. At the age of 17, the epiphyseal union was completed in 100% of the hand-wrist x-ray and 81.8% of the shoulder and pelvis roentgenograms.

As a result, bone age is advanced in comparison with the chronological age by using recent methods. Standard data for domestic population must be collected by means of the x-rays of healthy people having regular demographic records and new standards should be established to prevent misinterpretation of the cases.