Risk Of Osteoporotic Hip Fractures Research Articles

Nutritional status in patients with rheumatoid arthritis: is there an association with the sarcopenic phenotype of body composition?

Aim – to evaluate the nutritional status and its relationship with the sarcopenic phenotype of body composition in women with rheumatoid arthritis (RA).Material and methods. The study included 91 women aged 40 to 75 years with RA according to ACR/EULAR criteria (2010) and a disease duration of at least 1 year. A questionnaire, laboratory and densitometric examination were conducted. Nutritional status was assessed using a MNA (Mini Nutricial Assessment) questionnaire.Results. Malnutrition and at risk of malnutrition according to the MNA were detected in 44.0% of patients with RA. These patients differed from those with normal nutritional status with a higher risk of osteoporotic hip fractures according to FRAX (p=0.035), lower appendicular muscle mass (AMM) (p=0.048) and lower self-assessment of health status (p=0.012). Patients significantly differed in nutritional status according to MNA, daily intake of calcium with food, circumferences of the mid-upper arm, calf, waist and hips, depending on the presence of sarcopenic phenotype. Multivariate regression analysis showed that the sarcopenic phenotype was associated with a nutritional status according to MNA less than 24 points (odds ratio (OR) – 6.14; p=0.036), daily calcium intake less than 500 mg (OR=9.55; p=0.007) and mid-upper arm circumference less than 25 cm (OR=9.32; p=0.015).Conclusion. Malnutrition was found in almost half of the patients with RA. It was revealed that a low nutritional status according to the MNA, low calcium intake and mid-upper arm circumference less than 25 cm increased the risk of having a sarcopenic phenotype in women with RA.

Nutritional status and osteoporotic phenotype of body composition in patients with rheumatoid arthritis

Aim. To evaluate the nutritional status and its relationship with osteoporotic phenotype of body composition in women with rheumatoid arthritis (RA).Material and methods. The study included 91 women aged 40 to 75 years with RA according to ACR/EULAR criteria (2010). A questionnaire, laboratory examination and dual X-ray absorptiometry of whole body, lumbar spine and proximal femur were conducted. Nutritional status was assessed using a MNA (Mini Nutricial Assessment) questionnaire.Results. Risk of malnutrition and malnutrition according to the MNA were detected in 42.9 % and 1.1 % of patients with RA, respectively. These patients differed from those with normal nutritional status with a higher risk of osteoporotic hip fracture according to FRAX (p = 0.035), lower appendicular muscle mass (AMM) (p = 0.048) and lower QOL according to VAS (p = 0.012). A positive correlation was established between the nutritional status by MNA and BMI (r = 0.280; p = 0.007), as well as total muscle mass (r = 0.280; p = 0.008), AMM (r = 0.320; p = 0.002) and AMM index (r = 0.280; p = 0.009). In multivariate logistic regression analysis, age above 55 years (OR = 7.76; 95 % CI: 2.17–27.69), nutritional status by MNA (OR = 0.68; 95 % CI: 0.51–0.92) and AMM index less than 6 kg/m2 (OR = 3.43; 95 % CI: 1.16–10.21) were independent factors associated with osteoporotic phenotype in RA patients.Conclusion. Malnutrition occurred in 44.0 % of RA patients. Women at risk of malnutrition had a higher 10-year probability of hip fracture according to FRAX. Age and AMM index were positively associated, while nutrition status according to MNA was negatively associated with osteoporotic phenotype of body composition.

Alcohol Consumption, Bone Mineral Density, and Risk of Osteoporotic Fractures: A Dose-Response Meta-Analysis.

Excess alcohol consumption is known to be detrimental to human health. However, the role of light-to-moderate alcohol intake is under investigation for potential certain health benefits—mostly related to the cardiovascular system. Nevertheless, there is no univocal agreement on this matter, and research is still ongoing to clarify whether there might be other potential outcomes affected by alcohol intake. In this regard, there is evidence that excess alcohol intake may negatively influence the risk of osteoporotic fractures. However, there is no comprehensive evidence of literature assessing the role of alcohol consumption in bone mineral density (BMD) and the risk of osteoporotic fractures. Thus, the aim of this study was to quantitatively assess the dose–response relationship between alcohol intake and BMD and risk of osteoporotic fractures. The Embase and MEDLINE electronic databases were searched from their inception to December 2021 for articles providing a quantifiable measurement of alcohol consumption for at least three categories and (1) a measurement of BMD (and dispersion as continuous variables) in some area of the body or (2) risk of osteoporotic fracture provided as relative risk (RR) or hazard ratio (HR), with a 95% confidence interval (CI) as the measure of the association of each category with alcohol intake. A total of 11 studies including 46,916 individuals with BMD assessment and 8 studies including 240,871 individuals with risk of fracture analysis were included. Compared to non-drinkers, consumption of up to two standard drinks of alcohol per day was correlated with higher lumbar and femur neck BMD values, while up to one standard drink of alcohol was correlated with higher hip BMD compared to no alcohol consumption. Higher risk of hip fractures was found starting from three standard drinks of alcohol per day (RR = 1.33, 95% CI: 1.04; 1.69 for three alcoholic drinks/d, and RR = 1.59, 95% CI: 1.23; 2.05 for four alcoholic drinks/d) compared to no alcohol consumption, with no evidence of heterogeneity. Concerning the risk of any osteoporotic fractures, the risk steadily increased with higher intake of alcohol, although never reaching statistical significance. In conclusion, there is consistent evidence that increased alcohol consumption is associated with higher risk of osteoporotic hip fracture; however, the role of alcohol at lower doses is uncertain, as BMD was even higher in light drinkers compared to abstainers.

CXCL9 Predicts the Risk of Osteoporotic Hip Fracture in a Prospective Cohort of Chinese Men-A Matched Case-Control Study.

Recent experimental work has identified CXCL9 as a promoter for the differentiation of osteoclast progenitors into osteoclasts, with resultant bone resorption. However, no human study has validated an association between this chemokine and osteoporosis or fracture risk. We conducted a matched case-control study nested in the prospective, population-based Singapore Chinese Health Study. Fifty-five men and 119 women with incident hip fractures, occurring median 6.2 years after blood collection, were matched individually to controls by age at recruitment, sex, and duration of blood storage. Serum chemokines, CXCL9 and CXCL10, were measured using immunoassays. Multivariable conditional logistic regression models that included age at blood collection, body mass index, smoking, and diabetes as covariates were used to estimate odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) for association with hip fracture risk. Predictive utility of chemokine for hip fracture risk was examined by comparing area under receiver operating characteristic curves (AUC) between prognostic models with and without the chemokine. Increasing CXCL9 levels were associated with increasing hip fracture risk in men but not in women (pinteraction =0.002); comparing extreme quartiles, the OR (95% CI) in the highest quartile was 10.35 (1.90-56.39) in men (ptrend =0.002) but 1.46 (0.59-3.60) in women (ptrend =0.32). Adding CXCL9 to a prognostic model that already incorporated age and other risk factors improved the AUC (95% CI) from 0.65 (0.55-0.76) to 0.74 (0.65-0.83) for the predictive utility of hip fractures in men but not in women. Conversely, the association between CXCL10 and hip fracture risk was not statistically significant in either sex. © 2022 The Authors. Journal of Bone and Mineral Research published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Society for Bone and Mineral Research (ASBMR).

Hepatic encephalopathy increases the risk of hip fracture: a nationwide cohort study

BackgroundOsteoporotic hip fracture is a common general health problem with a significant impact on human life because it debilitates the patients and largely decreases their quality of life. Early prevention of fractures has become essential in recent decades. This can be achieved by evaluating the related risk factors, as a reference for further intervention. This is especially useful for the vulnerable patient group with comorbidities. Hepatic encephalopathy (HE), a major complication of liver cirrhosis, may increase the rate of falls and weaken the bone. This study evaluated the correlation between hepatic encephalopathy and osteoporotic hip fracture in the aged population using a national database.MethodsThis retrospective cohort study used data from Taiwan’s National Health Insurance Research Database between 2000 and 2012. We included people who were older than 50 years with hepatic encephalopathy or other common chronic illnesses. Patients with and without hepatic encephalopathy were matched at a ratio of 1:4 for age, sex, and index year. The incidence and hazard ratios of osteoporotic hip fracture between the both cohorts were calculated using Cox proportional hazard regression models.ResultsThe mean age of the enrolled patients was 66.5 years. The incidence ratio of osteoporotic hip fracture in the HE group was significantly higher than that in the non-HE group (68/2496 [2.7%] vs 98/9984 [0.98%]). Patients with HE were 2.15-times more likely to develop osteoporotic hip fractures than patients without HE in the whole group. The risk ratio was also significantly higher in female and older individuals. The results were also similar in the comorbidity subgroups of hypertension, diabetes mellitus, hyperlipidemia, senile cataract, gastric ulcer, and depression. Alcohol-related illnesses seemed to not confound the results of this study.ConclusionsHE is significantly associated with an increased risk of osteoporotic hip fractures, and the significance is not affected by the comorbidities in people aged more than 50 years. The cumulative risk of fracture increases with age.

Body Anthropometry and Bone Strength Conjointly Determine the Risk of Hip Fracture in a Sideways Fall

We hypothesize that variations of body anthropometry, conjointly with the bone strength, determine the risk of hip fracture. To test the hypothesis, we compared, in a simulated sideways fall, the hip impact energy to the energy needed to fracture the femur. Ten femurs from elderly donors were tested using a novel drop-tower protocol for replicating the hip fracture dynamics during a fall on the side. The impact energy was varied for each femur according to the donor’s body weight, height and soft-tissue thickness, by adjusting the drop height and mass. The fracture pattern, force, energy, strain in the superior femoral neck, bone morphology and microarchitecture were evaluated. Fracture patterns were consistent with clinically relevant hip fractures, and the superior neck strains and timings were comparable with the literature. The hip impact energy (11 – 95 J) and the fracture energy (11 – 39 J) ranges overlapped and showed comparable variance (CV = 69 and 61%, respectively). The aBMD-based definition of osteoporosis correctly classified 7 (70%) fracture/non-fracture cases. The incorrectly classified cases presented large impact energy variations, morphology variations and large subcortical voids as seen in microcomputed tomography. In conclusion, the risk of osteoporotic hip fracture in a sideways fall depends on both body anthropometry and bone strength.

Combining shape and intensity dxa-based statistical approaches for osteoporotic HIP fracture risk assessment

Aiming to improve osteoporotic hip fracture risk detection, factors other than the largely adopted Bone Mineral Density (BMD) have been investigated as potential risk predictors. In particular Hip Structural Analysis (HSA)-derived parameters accounting for femur geometry, extracted from Dual-energy X-ray Absorptiometry (DXA) images, have been largely considered as geometric risk factors. However, HSA-derived parameters represent discrete and cross-correlated quantities, unable to describe proximal femur geometry as a whole and tightly related to BMD. Focusing on a post-menopausal cohort (N = 28), in this study statistical models of bone shape and BMD distribution have been developed to investigate their possible role in fracture risk. Due to unavailable retrospective patient-specific fracture risk information, here a surrogate fracture risk based on 3D computer simulations has been employed for the statistical framework construction. When considered separately, BMD distribution performed better than shape in explaining the surrogate fracture risk variability for the analysed cohort. However, the combination of BMD and femur shape quantities in a unique statistical model yielded better results. In detail, the first shape-intensity combined mode identified using a Partial Least Square (PLS) algorithm was able to explain 70% of the surrogate fracture risk variability, thus suggesting that a more effective patients stratification can be obtained applying a shape-intensity combination approach, compared to T-score. The findings of this study strongly advocate future research on the role of a combined shape-BMD statistical framework in fracture risk determination.

Predictors of risk of fracture in inflammatory bowel diseases: a prospective study using FRAX score.

Despite the well-known risk of osteoporosis and bone fractures among patients with inflammatory bowel diseases, the WHO FRAX tool has been used in a limited number of studies in this specific population. The purpose of this study was to search for predictors of risk of fractures assessed by FRAX score. We prospectively calculated FRAX score for hip and major osteoporotic fractures in inflammatory bowel disease patients consecutively recruited. The mean risk of hip fractures at 10 years, for the 80 recruited patients, resulted 1.4%, while the mean risk of major osteoporotic fractures was 7.8%. The risk of hip fractures was 1.3% among the 30 Crohn's disease patients versus 1.4% (P=0.82) among 50 ulcerative colitis patients. A prolonged use of corticosteroids correlated with a tendency to a greater risk of hip fracture (r=0.38, P=0.08). Patients with normal erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) values had a risk of osteoporotic hip fractures of 0.75%, while those with high ESR values had a risk of 1.86% (P=0.04). Regarding the risk of major bone fractures, patients with normal ESR values had a risk of 5.9%, versus a risk of 18% in those with elevated ESR (P=0.03). The correlation between increase of inflammatory markers and increased risk of osteoporotic fractures and the lack of difference between Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis suggest a central role of inflammation over malabsorption in this population.

High- and low-viscosity cement for osteoporotic femoral augmentation: A computational subject-specific approach

The risk of osteoporotic hip fractures may be reduced by augmenting susceptible femora with high- and low-viscosity cement. As the injection of excessive amounts of cement may result in thermal necrosis of bone tissue or even embolism, the minimum cement volume required to achieve a predefined level of augmentation should be determined. To this end, the present work introduces a novel efficient generalized augmentation strategy combining a strain-based fracture criterion with experimental results of bone augmentation previously obtained. The proposed methodology aims to estimate the fracture load improvement with two cement types (high- or low-viscosity).In total, 18 healthy and 17 osteoporotic ex vivo femora were numerically studied using the Finite Element Method and considering a typical lateral fall on the greater trochanter. In all cases, both a nonaugmented and an augmented state with injected bone cement were simulated. All augmented models of femora exhibited enhanced fracture loads regardless of the cement viscosity used. Low viscosity cement showed a higher fracture load improvement than high-viscosity cement. Furthermore, augmentation of osteoporotic femora estimated a larger improvement in the fracture load (10.32 ± 3.22% with high-viscosity cement and 28.93 ± 7.04% with low-viscosity cement) with respect to healthy femora (9.41 ± 3.66% with high-viscosity cement and 25.19 ± 6.00% with low-viscosity cement). The results suggest that low-viscosity cement can be a powerful candidate for use in femoroplasty. Furthemore, the proposed methodology can be efficiently used for preoperative planning of bone augmentation surgery.

Previous Damage Accumulation Can Influence Femoral Fracture Strength: A Finite Element Study.

To manage osteoporotic hip fracture risk, it is necessary to understand failure mechanisms of bone at both the material and organ level. The structural response of bone is dependent on load history. Repeated loading causes progressive microstructural cracking, resulting in reduced apparent-level stiffness and, if damage is significant, reductions to peak load bearing capability. However, the effect of previous damage accumulation has not been well explored at the organ level. It was hypothesized that femoral fracture load and fracture pattern may be sensitive to damage accumulation from previous loading events. Six cadaveric specimens were used to develop patient specific finite element (FE) models from quantitative tomographic (qCT) scans. Material properties were assigned from qCT intensity at each element location, and damage evolution was predicted using a previously validated quasi-brittle FE model. Three scenarios were investigated: stumble followed by another stumble (S-S), fall followed by another fall (F-F), and stumble followed by a fall (S-F). Fracture load and pattern were compared to FE predictions for a single stumble (S) or single fall (F) loading event. Most specimens were resilient to accumulated damage, showing little (<5%) change in fracture load from the multiple-load scenarios (S-S, F-F, and S-F) compared to an equivalent single load scenario (S or F). Only one specimen demonstrated moderate (5-15%) reductions in strength from all three multiple-load scenarios. However, two specimens experienced moderate (20-30%) increase in fracture load in some load cases. In these cases, initial damage caused the load to be more evenly distributed upon subsequent loading events. © 2019 Orthopaedic Research Society. Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Orthop Res 37:2197-2203, 2019.

Patient-specific finite element estimated femur strength as a predictor of the risk of hip fracture: the effect of methodological determinants.

SummaryA finite element modelling pipeline was adopted to predict femur strength in a retrospective cohort of 100 women. The effects of the imaging protocol and the meshing technique on the ability of the femur strength to classify the fracture and the control groups were analysed.IntroductionThe clinical standard to estimate the risk of osteoporotic hip fracture is based on the areal bone mineral density (aBMD). A few retrospective studies have concluded that finite element (FE)-based femoral strength is a better classifier of fracture and control groups than the aBMD, while others could not find significant differences. We investigated the effect of the imaging protocol and of the FE modelling techniques on the discriminatory power of femoral strength.MethodsA retrospective cohort of 100 post-menopausal women (50 with hip fracture, 50 controls) was examined. Each subject received a dual-energy absorptiometry (DXA) exam and a computed tomography (CT) scan of the proximal femur region. Each case was modelled a number of times, using different modelling pipelines, and the results were compared in terms of accuracy in discriminating the fracture and the control cases. The baseline pipeline involved local anatomical orientation and mesh morphing. Revised pipelines involved global anatomical orientation using a full-femur atlas registration and an optimised meshing algorithm. Minimum physiological (MPhyS) and pathological (MPatS) strengths were estimated for each subject. Area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC) was calculated to compare the ability of MPhyS, MPatS and aBMD to classify the control and the cases.ResultsDifferences in the modelling protocol were found to considerably affect the accuracy of the FE predictors. For the most optimised protocol, logistic regression showed aBMDNeck, MPhyS and MPatS to be significantly associated with the facture status, with AUC of 0.75, 0.75 and 0.79, respectively.ConclusionThe study emphasized the necessity of modelling the whole femur anatomy to develop a robust FE-based tool for hip fracture risk assessment. FE-strength performed only slightly better than the aBMD in discriminating the fracture and control cases. Differences between the published studies can be explained in terms of differences in the modelling protocol and cohort design.

The association between osteoporotic hip fractures and actinic lesions as a biomarker for cumulative sun exposure in older people-a retrospective case-control study in Argentina.

The aim of this study was to analyze the association between the presence of actinic lesions (solar keratosis and non-melanoma skin cancer) and osteoporotic hip fractures in older patients. Both pathologies are common conditions in this age group. Since cumulative sun exposure is difficult to quantify, the presence of actinic lesions can be used to indirectly analyze the association between ultraviolet radiation and osteoporotic hip fractures. This was an observational case-control study. We reviewed the centralized medical records of patients with hip fracture (cases, n=51) and patients with other diseases hospitalized in the same institution and period (controls, n=59). The mean age of the patients was 80±8.3years (range 50-103years). Differences in maternal hip fracture history were found between cases and controls (14.8 and 8%, respectively; p=0.047). Falls history in the past year was higher in cases than in controls (p<0.0001). Actinic lesions were observed in 32.7% of patients (prevalence rate23.5% in cases, 40.7% in controls; p=0.04). When considering patients with actinic lesions, controls have a higher FRAX score compared with cases. Although sun exposure is recommended for bone health, it represents a risk factor for actinic lesions. The presence of actinic lesions may indicate a lower osteoporotic hip fracture risk. A balance between adequate lifetime sun exposure and protection against its adverse effects is required for each patient, in the context of geographic location.

Bone turnover biomarkers and risk of osteoporotic hip fracture in an Asian population

While epidemiologic studies suggest that bone turnover biomarkers may predict hip fracture risk, findings are inconsistent and Asian data are lacking. We conducted a matched case–control (1:1) study nested in the Singapore Chinese Health Study, a population-based prospective cohort of Chinese men and women (45–74years) recruited from 1993 to 1998 in Singapore. One hundred cases with incident hip fracture and 100 individually matched controls were randomly selected from 63,257 participants. Serum bone turnover biomarkers, namely bone alkaline phosphatase (bone ALP), osteocalcin (OC), procollagen type I N propeptide (PINP), N-terminal and C-terminal crosslinking telopeptide of type I collagen (NTX-I and CTX-I) were measured using immunoassays. Hip fracture cases had significantly higher serum levels of OC, PINP, CTX-I and NTX-I than controls (p<0.05). There was a dose-dependent positive relationship between OC, PINP, CTX-I and NTX-I and risk of hip fracture (all Ps for trend≤0.006), where the risk was significantly increased by 4.32–8.23 folds for the respective BTM [Quartile (Q) 4 vs. Q1]. The odds ratio [OR (95% CI)] at the highest quartile (Q4) was 6.63 (2.02–21.18) for PINP and 4.92 (1.67–14.51) for CTX-I. The joint effect of PINP and CTX-I showed a 7-fold increase in risk (OR: 7.36; 95% CI: 2.53–21.41) comparing participants with higher levels of PINP (Q4) and CTX-I (Q3–Q4) to those with low levels of PINP (Q1–Q3) and CTX-I (Q1–Q2). Our data demonstrated that higher serum levels of bone turnover biomarkers were associated with increased risk of hip fracture in an Asian population.

Genome-Wide Survey of Runs of Homozygosity Identifies Recessive Loci for Bone Mineral Density in Caucasian and Chinese Populations

Runs of homozygosity (ROHs), in which both parental alleles are identical, have been proposed to have recessive effects on multiple human complex diseases. Osteoporosis is a common complex disease characterized by low bone mineral density (BMD), which is highly heritable. And recessive loci that contribute to BMD variations have been identified. In this study, we performed a genome-wide ROHs association study using our SNP array data from three GWAS samples including 4,900 subjects from Caucasian and Chinese populations. Significant results were further subjected to replication in 3,747 additional subjects. ROHs associated with BMD were also tested for associations with osteoporotic fractures in a GWAS fracture sample. Combining results from all the samples, we identified 697 autosomal regions with ROHs. Among these, we detected genome-wide significant associations between BMD and 6 ROHs, including ROH1q31.3, 1p31.1, 3q26.1, 11q12.1, 21q22.1 and 15q22.3 (combined P = 6.29 × 10(-5)-3.17 × 10(-8)). Especially, ROH1p31.1 was found to be associated with increased risk of osteoporotic hip fractures (odds ratio [OR] = 3.71, P = 0.032). To investigate the functional relevance of the identified ROHs, we performed cis-expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) analysis in lymphoblast cell lines. Three ROHs, including ROH1p31.1, 11q12.1, and 15q22.3, were found to be significantly associated with mRNA expression levels of their nearby genes (PeQTL < 0.05). In summary, our findings reveal that ROHs could play as recessive-acting determinants contributing to the pathogenesis of osteoporosis. Further molecular and functional studies are needed to explore and clarify the potential mechanism.

The role of sarcopenia in the risk of osteoporotic hip fracture.

Several common age-related mechanisms and factors influence muscle and bone, affecting functionality of both tissues. Sarcopenia is closely linked with osteoporosis, and their combined effect may exacerbate negative health outcomes. Fall-related fractures are some of the most serious consequences of these two systemic pathologies, with hip fracture being a major complication affecting osteoporotic and sarcopenic elderly. This work aims to review the literature on the current state of knowledge about the relations between sarcopenia and osteoporosis and to present the association between sarcopenia and osteoporosis and the risk of hip fracture. A literature search was performed in PubMed and Scopus databases for articles with the predefined terms "sarcopenia," "muscular atrophy," "femoral fractures," "hip fractures," "osteoporosis," and "bone density." There is a growing and significant interest being directed to sarcopenia and associated risk for osteoporotic hip fracture, but there still is a notorious heterogeneity in the methodology and cohort size of the available studies. Collectively, most of the studies herein analyzed indicate that sarcopenia could be a predictor of risk for hip fracture. The simultaneous evaluation of sarcopenia and osteoporosis may be of importance in identifying those patients in higher risk of suffering an osteoporotic hip fracture and who could benefit from preventive or therapeutic interventions, or both.

Risk of hip fractures in men with alpha-blockers: a nationwide study base on claim registry.

BackgroundAlpha-blocker can result in falling and fractures because of adverse effect such as orthostatic hypotension due to vasodilatory effect. We investigated the association between the alpha-blocker and the risk of osteoporotic hip fractures using a nationwide claim database.MethodsWe identified 1,051,651 men 65 years of age or older who had prescription records of alpha-blocker from nationwide medical claim database, from 2007 to 2012. Alpha-blockers were classified as non-specific general (NSG), non-specific slow-release (NSSR), uro-specific general (USG), and uro-specific slow release (USSR).ResultsTotal of 6,553 hip fractures were observed. The incidences of hip fracture within 1 year were higher than those of the reference periods in all type of alpha-blocker. Hazard ratio peaked at early period of alpha-blocker, and decreased with time, regardless of type of alpha-blocker.ConclusionsUse of alpha-blocker is associated with increased risk of hip fracture, especially in early use.

Risk of osteoporotic fracture after steroid injections in Medicare patients

(HR=0.99) or LSJI (HR=0.96). Long term steroid use increased spine fracture risk in ESI (HR=1.86) and LJSI patients (HR=1.41). Osteoporotic hip fracture risk was influenced by age, race, sex, CCMI, Cushing’s disease, LJSI (HR=0.95) and TSI (HR=0.95), but not ESI. Osteoporotic wrist fracture risk was influenced by age, race, sex, CCMI, LJSI (HR=0.91), but not by ESI or TSI. Conclusions Analysis of patients in the Medicare database showed that ESI, TSI or LJSI decreased osteoporotic spine fracture risk; but this may not be clinically relevant. Successive ESIs did not influence osteoporotic hip or wrist fracture risk, while LJSIs reduced the risk. Prolonged steroid exposure increases spine fracture risk in ESI and LJSI patients. Acute exposure to exogenous steroids via the epidural space, transforaminal space or large joints does not seem to increase the risk of an osteoporotic fracture of the spine, hip or wrist.

Low skeletal muscle mass associates with low femoral neck strength, especially in older Korean women: the Fourth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (KNHANES IV)

Data gathered from a nationally representative cohort demonstrated that subject with low skeletal muscle mass had consistently low femoral neck composite strength indices for compression, bending, and impact, especially in older women, supporting the highly integrated nature of skeletal muscle and bone. Skeletal muscle and bone interact mechanically and functionally. The present study was performed to investigate the association between muscle mass and femoral neck composite strength indices using a nationally representative cohort. This is a population-based, cross-sectional study from Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys, including 1,275 Koreans (674 women and 601 men) aged 50 years or older. Femoral neck axis length and width were measured by hip DXA scans and were combined with BMD, body weight, and height to create composite indices of femoral neck strength relative to load in three different failure modes: compression, bending, and impact. Presarcopenia was defined as an appendicular skeletal muscle mass (ASM) divided by body weight that was less than 1 SD below the sex-specific mean for young adults. After adjusting for confounders, women with presarcopenia had consistently lower indices for compression strength (CSI), bending strength (BSI), and impact strength (ISI) than women without this condition. Men with presarcopenia had a lower ISI value than men without presarcopenia. Multiple regression analyses revealed that lower relative skeletal muscle mass (ASM/weight) associated significantly with lower values for all three femoral neck composite indices in women and with lower CSI and ISI in men. These findings provide the first clinical evidence for the notion that age-related low muscle mass may increase the risk of osteoporotic hip fractures by decreasing femoral neck strength relative to load, especially in older women, and support the highly integrated nature of skeletal muscle and bone.

Subject-specific planning of femoroplasty: An experimental verification study

The risk of osteoporotic hip fractures may be reduced by augmenting susceptible femora with acrylic polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) bone cement. Grossly filling the proximal femur with PMMA has shown promise, but the augmented bones can suffer from thermal necrosis or cement leakage, among other side effects. We hypothesized that, using subject-specific planning and computer-assisted augmentation, we can minimize cement volume while increasing bone strength and reducing the risk of fracture. We mechanically tested eight pairs of osteoporotic femora, after augmenting one from each pair following patient-specific planning reported earlier, which optimized cement distribution and strength increase. An average of 9.5(±1.7) ml of cement was injected in the augmented set. Augmentation significantly (P<0.05) increased the yield load by 33%, maximum load by 30%, yield energy by 118%, and maximum energy by 94% relative to the non-augmented controls. Also predicted yield loads correlated well (R2=0.74) with the experiments and, for augmented specimens, cement profiles were predicted with an average surface error of <2mm, further validating our simulation techniques. Results of the current study suggest that subject-specific planning of femoroplasty reduces the risk of hip fracture while minimizing the amount of cement required.

Risk of Osteoporotic Fracture after Steroid Injections in Medicare Patients

(HR=0.99) or LSJI (HR=0.96). Long term steroid use increased spine fracture risk in ESI (HR=1.86) and LJSI patients (HR=1.41). Osteoporotic hip fracture risk was influenced by age, race, sex, CCMI, Cushing’s disease, LJSI (HR=0.95) and TSI (HR=0.95), but not ESI. Osteoporotic wrist fracture risk was influenced by age, race, sex, CCMI, LJSI (HR=0.91), but not by ESI or TSI. Conclusions Analysis of patients in the Medicare database showed that ESI, TSI or LJSI decreased osteoporotic spine fracture risk; but this may not be clinically relevant. Successive ESIs did not influence osteoporotic hip or wrist fracture risk, while LJSIs reduced the risk. Prolonged steroid exposure increases spine fracture risk in ESI and LJSI patients. Acute exposure to exogenous steroids via the epidural space, transforaminal space or large joints does not seem to increase the risk of an osteoporotic fracture of the spine, hip or wrist.