SEMIAUTOMATED METHODS FOR CANCELLOUS BONE HISTOMORPHOMETRY USING A GENERAL-PURPOSE VIDEO IMAGE-ANALYSIS SYSTEM

Semiautomated methods are used to measure elongated, curved and comple x branching profiles and isolated perimeter segments in monochrome vid eo images with a general-purpose analysis system. These methods are us ed to make the major primary measurements of bone histomorphometry. Ac curacy and reproducibility of the image acquisition, processing and me asurement system is documented by measuring a semicircular standard of known dimensions. Semiautomated applications of the Ar/Le method for measuring areas and perimeters, and calculating lengths and widths of osteoid seams, lengths of mineralization labels and mineral apposition rate, wall width, indirect measurements of eroded, osteoclastic and o steoblastic perimeters without tracing, and measurement of mineralized or total cancellous bone area and perimeter gave values comparable to measurements of the same parameters by tracing or grid counting techn iques with equal or better reproducibility and much greater efficiency . Intraindividual variation in measuring multiple bone biopsies was co mparable to that reported with current standard methods. Major sources of variability for semiautomated methods were image magnification and selection of profile edges by thresholding, and sources of variabilit y for manual methods are image magnification, numbers of orthogonal in tercepts, tracing speed and accuracy of the algorithm used to measure traced pixels. Semiautomated methods are accurate, reproducible and ra pid methods suitable for bone histomorphometry.