Abstract:
The lack of standardization in bone mineral density (BMD) measurements is known. Several studies have been carried out to cross-calibrate the axial dual X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) devices. Recently, a number of peripheral DXA (pDXA) densitometers have been introduced. In this study we evaluated the agreement between two heel DXA devices on BMD and T-scores. A total of 99 females aged 21–78 years (ca. 16 per decade) had their non-dominant heel BMD measured using the PIXI (Lunar Inc.) and the Apollo (Norland Medical) pDXA scanners. The mean BMD values were 0.492 and 0.607 g/cm2 and the mean T-scores using manufacturers’ specified reference data were −0.07 and −0.25 for the PIXI and Apollo, respectively. Both the BMD and T-score intermachine relationships were highly correlated but showed significant nonidentity slopes and non-zero offsets. The diagnostic comparison on T-scores resulted in 86% agreement between the instruments (weighted kappa score of 0.550). Normalizing the reference peaks and SDs using this study’s young adult population BMD results removed the systematic T-score disagreement. We found that PIXI and Apollo are highly correlated. Differences in BMD values are mainly due to different region of interest (ROI) definitions and additional T-score disagreement reflects the difference in normative databases.
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Received: 9 July 2001 / Accepted: 12 March 2002
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Grigorian, M., Shepherd, J., Cheng, X. et al. Does Osteoporosis Classification Using Heel BMD Agree Across Manufacturers?. Osteoporos Int 13, 613–617 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1007/s001980200082
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s001980200082