Aging Begins at 30

No Bones About It--Exercise, Calcium are Important

Osteoporosis means bones with microscopic holes in them. The total weight of the skeleton is therefore reduced. The bone that is left is normal, but there is much less of it. Bone lives and remodels or sculpts itself throughout life. Calcium and phosphorous turn over daily in our bony calcium bank. Bone is piezo electric, which in Greek means pressure producing an electric current. The current, in turn, stimulates the formation of bone.

In high school, or shortly thereafter, women's bones are at their strongest. There is a steady loss of bone from age 30 on, but the loss accelerates after menopause. Black women have heavier skeletons in their teen-age years, and although they lose bone at the same rtes as whites, they develop osteoporosis much less often. Men can develop the disease but do so 10 to 15 years later than women.

Bone comes in two types, spongy and cortical, or tube-like. The spongy bone of the spine suffers weight loss first. Thus, there is a loss in height. More disabling damage results from tube-like or cortical bone of the hip. This bone disease can be dangerous. Hip fractures lead to death in 15 percent within six months after the break.

Bad things can happen to hasten the disease. Inactivity will leech out the strength of the skeleton. Put a medical student to bed for three weeks, and she will approach the leached out bones and inactivity of an aging 80-year-old.

Smokers' bones age faster. Hip fractures occur in 52 percent of osteoporotic smoking women and 20 percent of osteoporotic nonsmokers and only in 8 percent of the general population of older women. Some, but not all, investigators believe too much phosphorous, as supplied in soft drinks, will counteract the good effects of calcium. Alcohol, especially in men, will increase the risk of osteoporosis twofold.

Now for the good news. A judicious mixture of estrogen, calcium and exercise can slow the bone loss and prevent fractures. It is best if you start at 30 (when aging starts) with adequate exercise and calcium. Appropriate doses of estrogen, usually with progesterone, will slow the loss of calcium that occurs after menopause. Your doctor can prescribe how much and how often.

Post-menopausal women tend to excrete more calcium than they ingest. Calcium intake should be 1,000 milligrams per day in younger women and 1,500 milligrams after menopause.

Osteoporosis can be halted or even prevented. The earlier you make regular exercise and a good diet rich in calcium part of your lifestyle the more certain you are that you will avoid a potentially painful and crippling bout with osteoporosis.

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See related Patient Topics Bones, Joints and Muscles, Calcium, Food, Nutrition and Metabolism, Osteoporosis, Seniors' Health or Women's Health.

See related Provider Topics Bones, Joints and Muscles, Calcium, Food, Nutrition and Metabolism, Osteoporosis, Seniors' Health or Women's Health.

All contents copyright © 1992-2004 the Author(s) and The University of Iowa. All rights reserved.

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