Abstract

Background: Identity of an individual is an imperative aspect in any kind of investigating procedure. There are numerous ways and means to do so in human beings (alive or dead), when a human body is in its entirety, but very few when only a part of it is available. In such cases, complete identification becomes unlikely and partial identification assumes importance to proceed into further investigations. There are various data available for identification. The height (stature) of an individual is one of them. There is scanty information regarding stature estimation by multiplication factor using head length in SouthIndian population. Material and methods: The present study is a crosssectional study includes 200 south Indian student population of S. Nijalingappa Medical College, Bagalkot. Aims and objectives: To correlate head length with stature, and to derive multiplication factor that can be applied for estimation of stature in South Indian population. Results: The average stature in the present study is 172.44 cm for males and 159.49 cm for females and the average head length from Nasion to Inion is 18.18 cm for males and 16.77 for females and from Glabella to Inion is 18.69 cm for males and 17.28 cm for females. Conclusions: There is a positive correlation between the head length with that of stature. The estimation of stature by derived multiplication factors are equally valid and can be used upon the South Indian population with fair degree of accuracy.

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