Tibia fractures are the most common injury in vehicle-to-pedestrian impacts. To provide accurate
injury risk predictions, sex differences in tibia properties should be investigated. The objective of this study was
to identify the relationship between structural properties and cortical bone morphometric parameters of tibiae
in males and females. Ten tibiae were impacted in a 6 m/s lateral-medial 4-point bending scenario to replicate a
vehicle-to-pedestrian blunt impact to the leg. Prior to testing, total length, maximum diameter, medial-lateral
diameter, and mechanical span measurements were taken. Total area (Tt.Ar), cortical area (Ct.Ar), cortical
thickness (Ct.Th), robustness (Tt.Ar/Length), area moment of inertia (I), and volumetric bone mineral density
(vBMD) were calculated from quantitative computed tomography (QCT) scans at 50% of total tibial length (i.e.,
fracture location). Peak force for the sample ranged from 12.5–21.9 kN (females: 12.5–21.9 kN; males: 12.7–20.2
kN). Peak force values were not significantly different between females and males. Overall, males demonstrated
larger cortical bone gross and cross-sectional morphometric values than females. Overall, these results suggest
that utilizing cortical bone morphometrics instead of body size-scaling may contribute to increasing the accuracy
of the biomechanical response in finite element simulations.
(Publisher abstract provided.)