More Facts About Osteoporosis

These are, to avoid drinking excess alcohol, get regular exercise, and don't smoke. I encourage you to speak to you health care provider for more information or if you wish to be screened for this condition.

For the last few decades, the medical community has been urging us to take increasingly higher doses of calcium supplements. Have the supplements been working? What harm could they possibly do? What else can I do to have strong bones? These are questions that should be answered for us to have strong bones and freedom from osteoporosis and osteoarthritis.

Do calcium supplements work for osteoporosis prevention or treatment? After decades of use, studies say that the answer is no. In an article entitled "Higher calcium intake won't cut women's osteoporosis risk, study says" by Shari Roan of the Los Angeles Times it was revealed that fracture risk did not decrease among women who began taking more calcium as they began to get older. We also know that Americans take huge amounts of calcium supplements and yet have one of the highest rates of osteoporosis in the world. Well, at least it was a good effort: it did not hurt to take the calcium. Or did it?

We are also noticing that folks that take calcium are experiencing things like bone spurs and kidney stones. Though many claim that calcium is the same no matter what the form this is just not true. The human body was made to consume appropriate foods containing calcium - not rocks made of calcium carbonate. The body will not pick up calcium that it does not need from organic sources (food). Because the body will only pick up and use the calcium that it actually needs, it must store the mass quantities that we ingest as inorganic tablets and capsules. We can make great bone spurs and kidney stones out of this stuff. But this avoids the real question.

If it is not high calcium intake that helps, what else can we do to have strong bones and avoid/heal from osteoporosis and osteoarthritis? This is the real question. In our society in North American we have several choices that can be broken down into two categories:

Drug treatment with substances like Boniva. While drugs like this can produce a denser bone growth, the bone is different. It is more susceptible to the crushing forces associated with normal weight bearing movement. In other words, it is heavier but more brittle. This does not help us much. On the negative side, side effects can occur such as:

1. gastric ulcers


2. pain in muscles, bones


3. jaw osteonecrosis (rotting of the jaw bone)


4. severe renal impairment: kidney disease


5. many more

Natural therapies such weight bearing exercise, sunshine (for Vitamin D), organic (food) minerals such as calcium, magnesium, silica, and appropriate help with hormonal balance. These therapies are especially intriguing because they can be helpful in our bone health without causing injurious side effects (such as with drug therapy). Let's make them clear so that you will be able to choose, obtain, and apply these therapies at your ease.

For decades we have heard that weight-bearing exercise causes bones to be strengthened. To do this exercise, we simply walk around and also pick things up and move them. This places a load on the bones.