Exercise is More Important Than Calcium Supplements for Bones
Monday, September 18, 2006
Healthline
A study making recent news concluded that taking calcium supplements does not do much to reduce bone fractures in childhood or later life. The study did not cover all reasons, but it does not stand alone. Studies over many years show that bone density depends on more than eating calcium. Calcium loss occurs through smoking, drinking too much alcohol and soda, lack of exercise, and eating animal protein. A young person can thin their bones through bad habits to the equivalent of an elderly person.
Bone density when you are older depends on what you are doing now. Sedentary lifestyle is a major risk for osteoporosis and fractures. Exercise thickens bones from the muscles pulling on them. Without exercise, you can lose bone density no matter how much calcium you eat. Without exercise, you "pee" the calcium you eat back out. You need to give calcium a reason to stick on your bones.
Even if you are a young man you need to build bone now. Osteoporotic hip and spine fractures are a major cause of illness and death for both women and men. One in eight men over age 50 will have an osteoporosis-related fracture, greater than his risk of prostate cancer. The death rate in the year following a hip fracture is nearly twice as high for men as for women.
Research in elder populations shows ability to increase bone density with exercise. Weightlifting is often mentioned as needed. People think they need to go to a gym or buy hand weights for home use. Weightlifting includes lifting groceries, children, and packages around the house. Weight-resisting activity includes moving, pulling, and lifting your own body weight. You can load your upper leg at the hip, a major site of osteoporosis, by bending right using your legs for all the many times you need to bend every day. Go to Disc Pain - Not a Mystery, Easy to Fix for tips. Future posts will show more bone building exercise from daily activities.
Several vitamins and minerals in fruit and vegetables help bone density. Calcium also needs vitamin D to work. Sunlight is an often forgotten source. Sunlight is necessary for your immune system, bones, mood, and overall health. There are some who say there is no safe sun exposure. Balance your time of exposure to reduce risk of cataracts and skin cancer. Get out of your chair and get outside in the sunshine for exercise every day.
Related Fitness Fixer:
- Stomach Acid Drugs Increase Osteoporosis and Hip Fractures
- How Often Should You Be Healthy?
- What is "Fitness as a Lifestyle?"
- Human Growth Hormone
- A Reader Asks About Osteoporosis and Walking Lightly
- Getting Stronger Without a Gym
- Getting Stronger is for Everyone
- Calories Burned in Prayer
- Sunlight Needed for Physical and Mental Health
- Forensic Anthropology and Bone Density
- Click labels below this article for all Fitness Fixer articles on those topics.
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Labels: aging, cancer, drugs, hip, nutrition, osteoporosis, practice of medicine, smoking, squat, strength
6 Comments:
At Tuesday, September 19, 2006 2:20:00 AM,
Anonymous said…
Thanks for this! My mom always made me drink my milk, and really I should have been running around the block ;-)
At Wednesday, September 20, 2006 12:57:00 AM,
Healthline said…
Good thinking. I will leave food to our two dietary blogs, but can comment on nutrients in fitness.
In the gym and "fitness" world, we see people buying protein shakes, bars, powders, supplements and more from milk and whey, and calling it "health food" when it is not so healthy. The heat process to kill germs in dairy products kills many nutrients. It is still being looked into, but there are good studies showing the milk sugar galactose to be associated with cataracts, and ovarian and prostate cancers. Increasingly, dairy cows are given hormones to increase milk production, antibiotics, and medicines which pass into the milk, contributing to a world problem of antibiotic resistance and other health effects still to be understood. It's also been found that eating dairy does not cause more weight loss than not eating dairy. Many store-bought protein powders have fillers, dyes, sweeteners, thickeners, and hidden stimulants so that you think you are feeling good or losing weight from the product, but are getting an unhealthy effect.
Some people say calcium loss is not that high from animal protein, including dairy. But small losses build, like spending money here and there until you don't know where it all went. The less animal protein, the less loss.
Getting enough healthy calcium and protein without dairy is easy with vegetables, seeds, legumes, and fermented vegetables. Fermenting increases protein and reduces phytates that reduce calcium absorption.
People are also overloading on unfermented soy. I'll comment more about seeing increasing numbers of patients and students getting thyroid deficiency, fibroids, and estrogenic effects that look to be coming from eating excess unfermented soy in "health foods." I have done a little professional work in this area but it is not my main area. I want to only comment on work I have personally done. If not, it is just repeating what you have heard from somewhere else. My book "Health and Fitness in Plain English" has a chapter called "Calcium, Protein, Space Flight, Exercise, and Your Bones - A Detective Story." It tells of the interesting studies of populations who eat little or no dairy and have strong bones, and their genetic relatives who eat much dairy and suffer more osteoporotic fractures. Some of my other books have nutrition chapters with easy, healthy, and good tasting recipes you can make easily, quickly, and inexpensively.
You have the right idea. Get outside. Take shut-ins outside. Volunteer outside. Make the world and yourself happier by going outside. Keep posting all the great ideas you have for healthier living.
At Saturday, September 23, 2006 2:26:00 PM,
Anonymous said…
I have 2 questions: What is it about hip fractures that causes so many subsequent deaths?
and
I've just learned that I have bone loss in my hips but it's only osteopenia so I understand I should be able to reverse it. Do you have any specific exercises to suggest (or any other suggestions)?
At Monday, September 25, 2006 4:14:00 PM,
Healthline said…
Following hip fracture, many people never walk unaided again, become sedentary, even bedridden. About 24 percent of hip fracture patients over age 50 die.
The two top causes of coroner documented death are the associated problems of not moving enough - pneumonia and cardiac events. These deaths include those that follow "successful" hip surgery. The risk of death rises when complications occur from the surgery and the months of recovery, directly leading to death or indirectly by reducing their ability to move, taking them back to the first two causes. Hospitals are a top source of antibiotic-resistant infections. Germs are concentrated there, with staff invasively touching patient after patient, giving many antibiotics, furthering resistance.
I don't regard a hip replacement as a success if the person has pain reduction but can do little more than sit in a chair or shuffle to the bathroom, or becomes unhealthy from their "health care." Unhealthy reduction in activity is preventable with a mindset that movement is crucial to recovery, and a program to regain function.
> (I learned recently that I have bone loss in my hips (the long bone??) but it's only osteopenia so I'm hoping to reverse it.
Bone loss in the "hip" is usually at the top of the upper leg bone (femur). The femur bends and narrows at the femoral neck before widening into the ball that fits in the hip socket. The femoral neck is where most fractures occur.
Some things to do (more with future posts): Reduce chances for bone loss: Studies of dieting for weight loss find bone loss at the hip, particularly with quick weight loss and high animal protein diets. Steroid anti-inflammatory medicines taken over long periods reduce bone density. This is saddening when people are taking these medicines for joint pain, harming their joints.
Thanks to your fixing your back pain by preventing overarching and a few other things we covered in the class and the posts on this site, you are walking much now and lift and carry things without pain. Bone loss can be stopped, even reversed, with exercise. Use the healthy bending I mentioned for all bending. I'll explain it more in the posts.
Kathy, thank you for insightful questions that help everyone's health.
At Saturday, November 24, 2007 7:11:00 PM,
Anonymous said…
Hi, I'm 27 yrs old female. I was diagnosed with NS in 2005 and had been taking steroids for treatment till Jan 2007. About 4 months ago, I found that I have suffered from mild osteoporosis as a side effect of taking long term steroids.
I am taking 1000 mg calcium every nite and try to hop on eliptical trainer 4 days a week. My daily diet mostly consists of lots of tofu & green veggies. I also love cheeses and yoghurts. My question is: 1) what is the recommended exercise time to stop or even reverse osteoporosis? 2) does drinking coffee really detriment my condition/my effort? (I am drinking 2-3 cups of instant coffee/day) 3) will I have problem with pregnancy? (I may get married soon)
At Monday, November 26, 2007 6:33:00 PM,
Jolie Bookspan, M.Ed, PhD, FAWM said…
Hello Anonymous, sorry you were on steroidal anti-inflammatories for so long.
- Better to spread out the 1000mg over the day, rather than only at night.
- How about adding some weight lifting. Elliptical machine may not be enough resistance exercise, and does not provide exercise for two main sites of bone loss - upper back and wrist. I have had several patients who had their shoulder joints destroyed by steroidal anti-inflammatory treatments. There are often better safer treatments for NS.
- Try to get your protein more from vegetable than animal source (cheeses and yoghurt) since animal protein promotes small calcium losses. Check how the tofu is processed and don't overdo, so that you are not getting large amounts of unfermented soy that interferes with calcium absorption and minerals needed for calcium to work. Don't smoke or drink alcohol or soda. See comments above.
- See my post Stomach Acid Drugs Increase Osteoporosis and Hip Fractures.It explains why to avoid them and what to use instead.
- Plain raw flax seeds and walnuts have been found to be effective to help bone health as vegetarian sources of omega-3 (n-3) fatty acids.
- Check to see if you have reaction to wheat products, an immune action called Celiac. Celiac is one of several predisposing factors for osteoporosis.
- Get sunshine every day. Sunshine is needed for many health aspects and disease prevention. Not so much that you sunburn, obviously. Also calcium does not absorb or work well without Vitamin D and a few other key minerals. Better to get nutrients from sun and good food than supplements.
For your questions:
1. There is no set recommended time for exercise. It depends greatly what kind you do and your degree of calcium balance and bone density.
2. It is not definitely know how much coffee can hurt. Many factors go into total calcium balance. If you are doing enough of the big things to add bone and prevent loss, then one smaller factor that detracts will not leave an overall deficit. A comparison for calcium balance in bone is saving money. Your amount at the end depends on the many things you spend on and the several avenues for savings.
3. What kind of problem with pregnancy concerns you?
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