Morphometry Of Jugular Foramen Of Dry Adult Human Skulls Of South India.

Jugular foramen (JF) lies between the occipital and the petrosal part of the temporal bone, and allows the passage of important nerves and vascular elements i.e. the glossopharyngeal, vagus, and accessory nerves and the internal jugular vein. It is a potential site for development of schwannomas, metastatic lesions, and infiltrative inflammatory processes from the surrounding structures such as middle ear. JF is difficult to approach surgically, but recent advanced techniques especially image intensifier to guide the suboccipital lateral approach have made the treatment possible despite the difficulties. Hence a detailed morphological and anatomical knowledge of this region is required. The morphologic dimensions, presence or absence of septation etc varies in various races and ethnic groups as reported in previous literature. But such detailed study has been lacking in south Indian population .Thus the present descriptive study was conducted in department of Anatomy, Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore on 50 dried adult human skulls i.e. 100 JF of Dravidian (south Indian) origin. The maximum antero-posterior and transverse diameter and depth of the jugular fossa of both sides were measured and septation was 6% on the right side and 8% on the left side using vernier calipers. The presence of spicules / septation of the jugular foramen were also observed on both sides. The obtained results presented variations regarding some parameters when compared to previous studies, thus making it evident the significance of race in the morphometric measurements and characteristics of the JF.