 This paper proposes a new method for evaluating the presence of corrosion in beam-like structures. It takes into account shear deformation, which is often overlooked in traditional methods and uses it to accurately identify damage. The proposed method involves determining the analytical displacements of the structure based on the Timoshenko beam theory, then minimizing a predefined objective function to find the optimal solution. The results show that the proposed method is effective at detecting damage in beam-like structures. This article was authored by Xiang Wei Meng, Feng Shao, Yu Yan, and others.