Bone Abstracts

Vitamin D plays an important role for bone health, and is associated to the risk of osteoporosis development.

The aim of the present work was to determine the association between serum vitamin D concentration and the bone mineral density (BMD) in post-menopausal women living in a Mexican rural community (this study was approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee). The BMD was assessed by ultrasound and vitamin D was evaluated using a specific immunoassay. Also, all the women were interviewed to record their family history. This study was approved by the Institutional Ethics Committee.

The sample size was composed of 63 post-menopausal women, which were evaluated for weight, height, body mass index, water percentage, muscle percentage and fat percentage. In addition a blood sample was obtained for serum vitamin D levels determination. To analyze the results, we categorized the concentrations of vitamin D (high, medium, low) within each densitometry group (normal, osteopenia, and osteoporosis). Comparisons were carried out using ANOVA (post-hoc Tukey). The results showed that the normal BMD/high vitamin D subgroup had significantly higher levels of vitamin D than its counterparts (osteopenia BMD/high vitamin D, osteoporosis BMD/high vitamin D, P=0.008 and P<0.001 respectively). Also, from their family history, we compared the time women breastfed and vitamin D levels categories. The analysis showed that those women with normal BMD but low vitamin D, and osteopenic women breastfed shorter times (P=0.008 and P=0.045, respectively) than those with normal BMD and high levels of vitamin D. In conclusion, although there were not remarkable differences between BMD groups in terms of levels of vitamin D, it is interesting the relationship between breastfeeding and vitamin D levels and some other approaches must be designed to analyze the implications of this relationship.