前頭洞発育の年齢的推移について

X線断層写真上の検討

抄録

In order to study the growth of frontal sinus with age, the frontal sinus was measured using X-ray tomography in a total of 1, 942 Japanese, 4 to 59 years in age without paranasal sinusal diseass (984 males and 958 females). The deta obtained were treated statistically with the following results.
1) The frontal sinus was found to be present in 84% at the age of 10 years and 96% at 19 years in male and in 74% and 96%, respectively, in female. Thus, it appears that the frontal sinus is present in a high percentage of subjects even under 10 years of age and that at least until 19 years of age presence or absence of the frontal sinus is determined. When conparisons are made between the left side and the right side, the frontal sinus was detected with higher incidences in the left side for both sexes.
2) The width of the frontal sinus shows growthdegree much greater than that seen in the frontal bone from about 6 to 8 years of age for both sexes. The growth almost completes until 16 to 18 years for males and 12 to 14 years for females. For male cases four growth patterns were seen in both left and right sides. On the other hand, the growth in the left side showed four patterns, whereas no pattern was observed in the right side.
3) The growth in the height of the frontal sinus started and completed at about the same periods as observed for the growth in the width of frontal sinus. However, some differences were seen in growth with age. For males the growth in the right side proceeded at a constant rate, but in the left side three patterns were found. On the other hand, in the females there were three patterns in the right side and four patterns in the left side.
4) The global growth rate of frontal sinus (maximal width of frontal sinus maximal height of frontal sinus/maximal width of orbita ×100) was examined as one of the index for growth of the frontal sinus. It was found that growth-degree much greater than that observed for the frontal bone starts from about 6 to 8 years for both males and females. Four patterns were seen in growth in the left side for both males and females, while in the right side for females no pattern was noted in growth. The growth almost completed by 18 to 19 years for males and by 12 to 14 years for females.
5) Marginal morphology tended to be more complexed with age for both males and females. In addition, there was a tendency that the greater the frontal sinus is the more complexed became the marginal morphology.
6) For both sexes, high positive correlation was seen in the growth between the width and the height of the frontal sinus and also in the growth of the height of the frontal sinus between left and right. Thus, it is considered that the frontal sinus shows growth in both width and height harmoniously.
7) In the growth of frontal sinus difference was seen between the right side and the left side, with superiority in growth in the left side. It was postulated that this difference may be explained by the fact that the difference in aeration in the nasal cavity between the left and rigth sides originated from deviations of nasal septum is involved in pneumatization of the frontal sinus.