Morphometric evaluation of lumbar intervertebral disc height in Egyptians

Lateral roentgenograms of the lumbar region of 200 subjects who were radiologically free from any bone disease and did not have any neurological manifestations, were selected and studied. The lumbar intervertebral disc spaces were measured from lumbar 1 to 5 vertebral levels. The mean and standard deviation of intervertebral disc height, vertebral body height and disc to vertebral body ratio were calculated for each level in all subjects and computed against sex, age, individual's height, weight and occupation. Mean disc height values showed a steady increase from the first down to the fifth vertebra for all variables. Mean disc height values were higher in males. Ageing was accompanied with a decrease in mean disc heights at all levels. Generally, body height and weight increments were associated with a parallel increase in mean disc height. Also, the nature of occupation showed some association with disc height. The disc to vertebral body ratio showed almost fixed values for all variables at all the vertebral levels with a steady and gradual increase from top to bottom in the order of lumbar one to lumbar five disc spaces to be about 0.08, 0.09, 0.10, 0.11 and 0.12 respectively. The possible application of the disc to vertebral body ratio for objective clinical assessment of intervertebral discs was discussed in health and disease