Role of Hand Anthropometry for Stature Estimation in Females of Bhavnagar-Gujarat

Anthropometry, the typical and traditional tool of physical anthropology, provides the scientific methods and techniques for taking various measurements for observations of living and their skeleton. Therefore, it is being widely used in medical science, especially in forensic sciences, for identification, which is an important step in crime investigation. Estimation of stature from different body parts and their relationship is an area of interest to forensic experts, anthropologists and anatomists.

To find out the relationship between stature and hand measurements and derive population specific regression equations for estimation of stature in females.

In present study, a total of 250 healthy female individuals between 18–25 years of age belonging to Bhavnagar region, were selected. All the individuals were measured for hand length & hand breadth separately on the right and left side and stature. All the data was subjected to statistical analysis using Microsoft Excel 2007 Software (Data Analysis).

The present study showed statistically significant and positive correlation between stature and measurements of hand. Stature had statistically significant (p < 0.001) and higher value of correlation(r) as 0.607, 0.594 and 0.601 for right, left and mean hand length and 0.498, 0.492 and 0.496 for right, left and mean hand breadth, respectively. Simple and multiple linear regression equations were derived for specific study population to estimate stature from hand measurements.

Hand length exhibited statistically significant and positive correlation with stature as compared to hand breadth. It is also concluded that the multiple regression formulae was the better predictor for stature estimation as compared to simple regression equation.