ANTHROPOMETRIC EVALUATION OF NASAL HEIGHT, NASAL BREADTH AND NASAL INDEX AMONG BINI CHILDREN IN SOUTHERN NIGERIA

Abstract

Background and Objective: The nasal dimensions are important cephalometric parameters used in physical anthropometry to distinguish different gender and groups of human population. It also used to categorize the human nasal morphology into five different morphological categories which include hyperleptorrhine, leptorrhine, mesorrhine, platyrrhine and hyperplatyrrhine. In this anthropometric study, the nasal morphological characteristics of the Bini children in Nigeria were evaluated and the prevalent nasal morphology of the study population determined. Methodology: This study involved randomly selected 500 Bini children (comprising 250 males and 250 females) between ages 5-12 years. The nasal dimensions of each subject were measured between relevant anatomical landmarks. These include the nasal height measured as distance between nasion and subnasale and the nasal breadth measured as distance between the most lateral points of right and left ala of the nose using a sliding caliper. The nasal index for each subject was calculated as nasal breadth divided by nasal height and expressed as percentage. Results: The mean nasal height for male and female Bini children was 4.58± 0.11 and 4.33 ± 0.10 while the mean nasal breadth was 4.05 ± 0.12 and 3.88 ± 0.11 respectively. The mean nasal index for male subjects (90.25 ± 1.33) was also higher than for female subjects (88.65 ± 1.50). The morphological classification showed the platyrrhine nose type as the most prevalent among the male (70.0%) and female (68.0%) Bini children. Conclusion: The nasal dimensions and nasal index demonstrated prominent sexual dimorphism and the dominance of platyrrhine nose type is the current trend in the nasal morphology of Bini children.