The 17,000 NHANES images are available in the following formats:

jpg - full spatial resolution and 8-bit grayscale jpgahe – jpg with adaptive histogram equalization (AHE) jpgaheus - jpg with adaptive histogram equalization (AHE) followed by unsharp masking tif8 - full spatial resolution and 8-bit grayscale resolution in TIFF format tif8roi - A small subset of the cervical spine images is available at full spatial resolution and 8-bit, cropped to regions of interest containing the spine area fullres - The 17,000 NHANES II images at full spatial and full 12-bit grayscale resolution, in raw "nh2" format, uncompressed marks - Vertebra coordinate values for a subset of about 600 of the images is available in ASCII text format

Information about the Second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES II)

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys

The National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES), conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control (NCHS/CDC), were designed to assess the health and nutritional status of adults and children in the United States through interviews and direct physical examinations.

These images are the digitized versions of the 17,000 x-ray films collected during the Second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES II) conducted by the NCHS during the years 1976-1980. In NHANES II 20,322 individuals were both interviewed and examined. For examined persons aged 25 through 74, two x-rays were made, with the exceptions that no x-rays were taken of pregnant women and no lumbar x-rays were taken on women under 50 years of age. X-rays of the cervical and lumbar spines were taken to provide evidence of osteoarthitis and degenerative disc disease.

The films were subsequently digitized at a horizontal and vertical sampling rate of 146 dpi using Lumisys laser scanning equipment.

The NHANES radiographs were scanned by Dr. Bernie Huang at the University of California at Los Angeles and the University of California at San Francisco. Dr. Huang’s group used a Lumysis 100 with a 175 micron spot to scan the first 6000 radiographs. The remaining radiographs were scanned on the Lumysis 150 again with a 175 micron spot size.

NOTE: This dataset is no-longer updated with new content.