Ultrasonic Diagnosis for Bone Fracture Healing Process

This paper describes an ultrasonic system that estimates bone healing process after a fracture. This system employs the frequency characteristics of the bone of rat. We made several rats with a small hole on a bone. The frequency characteristics were obtained from the Fourier Transform of the reflected waves from the bones, and the center of gravity was employed as the feature. The experimental result showed that the frequencies decreased according to the elapsed time from two weeks to four weeks. The results show a feasibility of quantifying the fracture healing process by ultrasonic system.