Osteoporosis Is Optional Part 2: Efficacy & Treatments

There is too much information to review concerning what the research tells us about the drugs used to treat osteoporosis for this segment. I will post in separate articles for each, so please be on the lookout. 

For now, the first thing we have to consider is efficacy.

Drug therapy for osteoporosis is recommended for those with a history of past hip or spine fractures based on the following: 

• Those with a T score of  <-2.5 at the head of your femur, total hip, and lumbar spine by a DEXA scan.
• Post menopausal women and men 50 and older with low bone mass, which is a T score between -1.0 and -2.5 via a DEXA scan, and 10 10-year hip fracture probability greater than 3% or a 10-year major osteoporosis-related fracture probability of greater than 20%.  

A T-score is how dense your bones are compared to the bone density of a young 30-year-old white female. 

Given that you lose some bone mass as you age, many older women were labeled osteoporotic or osteopenic, even though they had a normal bone density for their age. 

This is where efficacy needs to be considered, and you should be informed of the absolute risk of taking a drug to reduce the risk of a fracture.