Archive for the ‘Fracture’ Category
Frequent Fallers Benefit from Vit D3
Falls cause Fractures. Preventing falls, or decreasing the number of falls, decreases fractures. How can you do that? Twice daily physical therapy exercises help improve muscle strength, balance and endurance. Eliminating throw rugs and steps helps.
The big news at National Osteoporosis Foundation last month was about fall prevention with Vitamin D3. Lots of new information.
Fracture Prevention – Not Bone Mineral Density
The goal of Bone Health Evaluation and Treatment is Fracture Prevention! DXA and Bone Mineral Density (BMD) are useful tools for evaluation. But DXA and BMD are only one out of many tools for bone health evaluation. DXA t-score and BMD should never be the sole goal of treatment.
As an orthopedic surgeon, my goal is always Decreasing Fracture Risk. In the USA we sometimes seem to have forgotten that real goal. We focus too much on DXA t-scores. We should focus on the patient. We should treat “Clinical Osteoporosis”. The patient deserves a complete Bone Health evaluation.
Bone Not “Good Enough” = Anabolic Forteo
Bone that has Fractured = Bone NOT Good Enough = Bone which requires the Anabolic, Forteo. Any fracture, especially vertebral compression fracture, can mean that the bone is NOT Good Enough. A Falling Bone Mineral Density (BMD) can mean that the bone is NOT Good Enough.
Orthopedic Surgeons see patients because their bone has fractured. Often this is a Fragility Fracture – a fracture due to a fall from standing height. I treat osteoporosis because of the patients I saw as an orthopedic surgeon. My orthopedic training makes Fracture Prevention my #1 goal.