Infrared diagnostics of the human hand

Abstract

The study deals with thermographic (IRT) diagnosing in neuro-vascular diseases of the human hands such as the Carpal Tunnel Syndrome (CTS). It is considered to be an approach to screening thermal manifestations of the difference between the physiological temperature distribution in the skin of dorsal hands and pathophysiological temperature distribution in hands affected by CTS. We created a database of 178 thermal images of dorsal side of 162 healthy (nRS= 162) and 16 pathological hands (nCTS=16) with clinically diagnosed CTS of 9 patients. Pre-surgical thermograms of the hands with CTS of each subject were taken and stored using IRT (Thermocamera Fluke Ti55/20). We observed the temperature distribution in the entire hand and partial temperatures of the center point of carpals (D1) as well as the area of distal phalanges on middle fingers (D5). The Index of Median Nerve (DMI=(TD1−TD5) was determined based on resulting data. Test results obtained from measurements of the two points on the dorsal side of hands showed that the temperature of CTS hands is typically higher in the phalanges as opposed to the wrist (DMI<0, 62.5%), while the temperature is the lowest in distal phalanges (D5) of healthy hands (DMI≥0, 81.5%). The sensitivity of IRT diagnostic test in our diagnostic process of CTS was calculated to be 0,625. Results will be confirmed by further termal screening of statistically significant group of patients.