Decisions, Decisions...
As I mentioned on
Dec. 31st, a bone density scan showed I had osteopenia, which caused me to make a New Years resolution to drink more milk. I also got some calcium supplements and vitamin D to try to stop the bone loss. This course of action seemed to be right, especially since today, a press release from the science newswire
Newswise discussed a study from Australia due to be published in the March 2008 issue of the
Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism (JCEM), a publication of
The Endocrine Society. That study seemed to demonstrate that calcium therapy alone, although initially successful at preventing bone loss, was no different from placebo after three or five years.
In the study researchers at the University of Western Australia in Perth, evaluated the relative benefits of five years of calcium supplementation with or without vitamin D2 compared to placebo on hip bone mineral density (BMD) and bone related biochemistry in ambulatory elderly women aged 70-80 years.
According to the press release, the combination of 1200 mg of calcium a day and vitamin D 1000 IU maintained hip BMD constant for five years, while calcium alone after three or five years was no different than placebo.
The authors postulated that beneficial effect of calcium and vitamin D could be related to reducing bone turnover, the process of old bone constantly being reabsorbed and replaced with new bone, and suppressing parathyroid hormone (PTH) concentrations in individuals with relatively high PTH levels. PTH is a hormone that regulates calcium levels by taking calcium from bones and releasing it into the blood.
Great! I am doing something right-or am I?
On Jan. 15, Newswise had another article, this time from the University of Auckland in New Zealand published on-line in the British Medical Journal, warning calcium supplements may increase the risk of heart attack in healthy postmenopausal women.
So now I don't know what decision to make.
Of course, in our jobs we have to balance decisions every day, some of them more straight forward than others. For instance, over on our forum area, a nuclear medicine technologist has a decision to make on which SPECT/CT system to buy. In this case, there is no real downside, because all three manufacturers have excellent equipment; however, she wants to get the best system for her facility and is requesting help from any of our readers who might have gone through this decision process. If you can help her with her questions, go to our forums and let her know your opinions.
And for those of you who have worked, or are working, in bone densitometry; what do you think I should do about the calcium situation?