Scoliosis is characterized by a lateral curvature of spine in the coronal plane of at least 10°, showing three-dimensional deformities of the torso. Recently, a 3D body scanner was proposed as an ionizing radiation-free method, supplementary to clinical examinations and X-rays, for assessing scoliosis and its progression. Here we present an automatic method of analysis of the 3D images of the body torso delivered by the scanner, with the objective of capturing and characterizing deformities in the torso due to scoliosis. The method quantifies asymmetries in each of the torso contours, extracted from 2D cross sections of the 3D torso images, transverse to the vertical axis of the body. Three parameters were calculated: (1) circularity, (2) difference between the areas to left and right of the spinous process (LRAsm), and (3) difference between the ratios width/depth to the left and right of the centroid of the contour (ASR). The method was verified by analyzing twenty-six computed tomography images of patients with different types of scoliosis. In patients with thoracic scoliosis both LRAsm and ASR were larger, that is the asymmetry was stronger, in the thoracic than in the lumbar region, whilst in patients with lumbar scoliosis the inverse was obtained. Furthermore, larger values of LRAsm coincided with the apex position of scoliosis. The circularity factor did not capture scoliosis-related asymmetries. It may, however, be useful in localizing the vertebral level during analysis of 3D scanner data. The method can have the potential to use it for follow-up examinations of scoliosis, in addition to clinical examinations. Further validation of the method requires its application to 3D body scanner data, particularly for more cases of severe scoliosis, which have more irregular transverse contours and thus potential for improvement.

脊柱侧弯的特征是在冠状平面中脊柱的侧向弯曲度至少为10°，显示了躯干的三维变形。最近，有人提出了一种3D人体扫描仪作为一种无电离辐射的方法，作为临床检查和X射线的补充，用于评估脊柱侧弯及其进展。在这里，我们提出了一种自动方法，用于分析由扫描仪传送的身体躯干的3D图像，目的是捕获和表征由脊柱侧弯引起的躯干畸形。该方法量化了从3D躯干图像的2D横截面（垂直于身体的垂直轴）提取的每个躯干轮廓中的不对称性。计算了三个参数：（1）圆度，（2）棘突左侧和右侧区域之间的差异（LRAsm），以及（3）轮廓质心（ASR）左右两侧的宽度/深度比率之差。该方法通过分析不同类型脊柱侧弯患者的二十六个计算机断层扫描图像进行了验证。胸椎侧弯患者的LRAsm和ASR均较大，也就是说，胸椎比腰椎区域的不对称性更强，而腰椎脊柱侧弯的患者则相反。此外，较大的LRAsm值与脊柱侧弯的顶点位置重合。圆度因子未捕获脊柱侧弯相关的不对称性。但是，在分析3D扫描仪数据期间定位椎骨水平可能很有用。除了临床检查之外，该方法还可以用于脊柱侧弯的后续检查。该方法的进一步验证要求将其应用于3D人体扫描仪数据，尤其是对于严重脊柱侧弯的更多病例，这些病例的横向轮廓更加不规则，因此有改进的潜力。