[Mineral saturation, ossification and synostosis of the hand bones in adolescents and youth]

The results on X-ray densitometric studies of the hand bones in adolescent and young people at the age of 10--17 years (369 persons in all) are presented in the work. Processes of mineralization, ossification and synostosis, as the investigation has demonstrated, are closely connected with each other. From the beginning of ossification in the pisiform and sesamoid bones of the first metacarpophalageal joint (11--12 years of age) up to the completion of synostosis in short tubular bones of the hand (15--16 years of age), a decrease of mineral salts is noted in osseous tissue. Hence, accumulation of mineral salts in skeleton of children and adolescent persons does not occur smoothly, but rather distinctly reflects those functional changes which take place in the adolescent organism when the genital glands begin their increased activity.