Journal of the Royal Society, Interface
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Non-invasive methods for assessing fracture healing are crucial for biomedical engineers. An approach based on mechanical vibrations was tried out in the 1990s, but was soon abandoned due to insufficiently advanced technologies. The same approach is re-proposed in the present study in order to monitor the healing process of a lengthened femur with an external fixator. ⋯ The largest increase (approx. 22%) was observed for the first resonant frequency. After formation of the woven bone, the vibratory response remained almost the same, suggesting that the healing assessment could be related to the relative variation in the resonant frequencies. The results presented support the application of the IT approach for fracture healing assessment.