Exploratory study on the feasibility of knee thermography evaluation in different body fat percentage.

Abstract

Infrared thermography is increasingly adopted for pre-diagnosis and monitoring of different conditions. Knee osteoarthritis is widely studied and this pathology is often associated with obesity. Body fat is a confounding factor in the thermal imagine evaluation. Consequently, this study correlated the body fat percentage evaluated with the bioelectrical impedance analysis and thermal imagine of the knee region. Healthy young adults were recruited. The skin knee temperature and the bioelectrical impedance analysis were collected. A linear regression analysis was performed between the basal skin temperature of the knee region and weight, total fat percentage, right-leg and left-leg fat percentage. No associations were detected with weight, total fat percentage, and legs fat percentage. In the knee, in which the fat percentage is generally low, the fat percentage could be secondary in influencing the evaluation. This seems to make obesity not a limit during the skin thermal evaluation of the knee region.