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Updated: Jan 13, 2026

Evaluation of Patients' Posture and Gait Profile After Lumbar Fusion Surgery by Video Rasterstereography and Treadmill Gait Analysis
Published on: March 23, 2019
Correlation between skeletal maturity assessed by spheno-occipital synchondrosis (SOS) fusion and cervical vertebrae
Anka Sharma1, Sugandha Verma2, Simpy Amit Mahuli2
1ORAL MEDICINE AND RADIOLOGY, VSPM DENTAL COLLEGE AND HOSPITAL, NAGPUR, MAHARASHTRA, INDIA.
Abstract:
This review aims to systematically collect and analyze studies investigating the correlation between the skeletal age assessed by spheno-occipital synchondrosis (SOS) fusion and CVMI (cervical vertebrae maturation index). Based on PECO, a research question was framed as "Is there a correlation between skeletal maturity assessed by spheno-occipital synchondrosis (SOS) fusion and cervical vertebrae maturation index (CVMI)?" The review was submitted for registration in PROSPERO (receipt 550152). Keywords: skeletal maturity; spheno-occipital synchondrosis; and cervical vertebrae maturation were used to search data in the search engines: PubMed Central, Lilac, EBSCOhost, Science Direct, and Google Scholar. The search question was formulated as "skeletal maturity" AND "spheno- occipital synchondrosis" (OR "SOS") AND "cervical vertebrae maturation" (OR "CVMI"). The data extracted from the articles was tabulated and a meta-analysisof correlation was performed. Overall, a strong positive correlation (r = 0.876) between SOS fusion and CVMI was found, with significant statistical support (p < 0.01). Gender-specific analyses also showed strong correlations for both males (r = 0.898) and females (r = 0.877), however, high heterogeneity was observed, suggesting variability among studies. This systematic review demonstrates a strong positive correlation between SOS fusion and CVMI, suggesting that SOS fusion can be a reliable indicator of skeletal maturity. However, the considerable heterogeneity observed, particularly in gender-specific analyses, warrants further investigation with a homogenous population and larger sample size.
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