A COMPUTER-AIDED ALGORITHM FOR EVALUATING THERMOGRAMS OF THE HAND

The incidences of musculoskeletal cumulative trauma disorders (CTDs) o f the upper extremities have been increasing for the past several year s. Among the most prevalent of these disorders has been carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). Early identification of CTS symptoms can significantly decrease the chances of injuries that are costly to the individual an d to industry. One CTS diagnostic method that has gained interest is t hermography. However, the interpretation of thermograms has been disti nctly clinical and subjective. The purpose of this research was to dev elop and evaluate an algorithm that could run on a personal computer a t an industrial site and objectively screen and evaluate thermograms o f the hands. The algorithm worked in conjunction with a gray-scale sca nner. The scanner digitized the thermal information from a Polaroid(R) photograph, and the algorithm constructed histograms based on the tem perature distributions of the digitized thermographic data. Thermogram s from the palm side of the hands of 10 female patients were made and evaluated by a physician as asymptomatic (having no symptoms) of media n nerve injuries. After the algorithm calculated the temperature histo grams and temperature means of the thermographic data, it then compare d them statistically. Although this technique appears to hold signific ant promise for objectively evaluating thermograms of the hands, using color rather than gray-scale scanning technology would upgrade it sub stantially.