Analysis of Lip Prints as an Indispensable Tool for Identification and Sexual Dimorphism- A Cross Sectional Study

Abstract

Introduction: Cheiloscopy is one of the investigative methods that utilises the anatomy and morphology of lips to identify individuals by their lip prints. Lip prints are a distinctive pattern made up of ridges and grooves on the labial mucosa, or sulci labiorum; cheiloscopy is the study of such patterns.
Material and Methods: The study group comprised of 50 males and 50 females aged between 18 and 25 years in the Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College, AMU, Aligarh for a period of 1 year i.e., from August 2021 to September 2022.
Results: Each individual lips were divided into 4 regions- upper right, upper left, lower right, and lower left and a total of 400 lip regions (100x4) were assessed for 6 types of lip groove patterns- Type I, Type I’, Type II, Type III, Type IV, and Type V as per the Suzuki and Tsuchihashi classification.The most common type of lip print pattern in males was Type III (32.5%) while in females it was Type II (36%).
Conclusion: Lip prints are distinctive to each person and can be used to identify a person and ascertain their gender.