Wendy Lawson, at Menopause The Blog stopped over recently to say her hellos and let me know she had run across my blog. She has very kindly added The Magnolia Diaries to her blogroll and I wanted to return the favor and feature one of her blog posts today as a Guest Blogger.
She has a bang-up blog that covers current health issues for middle aged and menopausal women. Stop over and check her out. She’s got some great information there. In the meantime, you can enjoy this recent post.
Factors to Consider When Determining Bone Health
Posted on May 13th, 2008 by Wendy
A special section in today’s New York Times offers a “head-to-toe tour of the body” with expert information and advice on how to enhance our well-being as we age. The articles cover fourteen areas including our brain, heart, muscles, breast, bones and feet. I was particularly interested in an article by Tara Parker-Pope about bone health, and the medical community’s reliance on density scans to determine a woman’s risk for fractures.
Apparently, bone density is not always the most reliable indicator of bone health since bone loss occurs naturally with aging. It’s an important data point, to be sure. But the author points out that there are other factors that should be considered such as:
- Have you ever broken a bone as an adult?
- Did your mother break any of her bones?
- Does a vision problem make you clumsy?
- How far will you fall? (tall women are a high risk for hip fracture)
- Have you packed on pounds since your 20s? (this is the case where weight loss is not good!)
- Can you get out of a chair (without using your arms?)
In an earlier blogpost, I wrote about an online calculator that you can use to test your risk for a hip fracture using a questionnaire developed for participants in the Womens Health Initiative Study. It covers 11 factors that together may predict hip fractures more accurately than bone density alone.
If you’re interested in the latest research findings about biphosphonates like Fosamax, Boniva and Actonel, drugs which are prescribed for women who show signs of osteopenia (early bone loss) or osteoporosis, be sure to read my most recent blogpost below.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
I think your blog is great, and I would like to feature you on the new
Wellsphere. We feature only the best health bloggers on our WellPages,
which are special pages that our Health Knowledge Engine crafts to give
our users answers to their health questions. We would feature you on all
the pages on topics that our knowledge engine finds are related to your
blog postings. Because we have over 2 million visitors each month (and we
are growing rapidly), you would benefit from an expanded audience for
your writings. If you would like us to feature you, send me an email.
Cheers, Geoff
Hello Geoff and thanks for stopping by The Magnolia Diaries, Volume, II.
An expanded audience is always desirable, especially if my blog can help struggling perimenopausal women find some relief.
I will check out your site link.
Thank you