Bone Abstracts

Objectives: Clinicians practicing in long-term care (LTC) face unique challenges caring for frail elderly individuals including multiple co-morbidities, polypharmacy, and end of life care, and practice guidelines typically do not address this population. Guidance regarding the management of osteoporosis and fracture prevention in LTC, a high-risk population, is needed.Materials and methods: A survey of LTC physicians informed key questions and outcomes, ...

Background: Bisphosphonates are increasingly used to treat disorders of low bone mineral density (BMD) in children and adolescents. Long-term bisphosphonate use in adults has been associated with and increased risk of atypical subtrochanteric and diaphyseal femoral fractures (AFFs). To date, bisphosphonate-related AFFs have not been reported in children or adolescents.Presenting problem: A 16-year-old girl presented with a 3-week history of left thigh pa...

Screening gene function in vivo is a powerful approach to discover novel drug targets in the human genome (Nat Rev Drug Discov 2 38–51, 2003). We present data for 3776 distinct gene knockout (KO) mouse lines with viable adult homozygous mice generated using both gene-trapping and homologous recombination technologies. Bone mass was determined from PIXImus DEXA scans of male and female mice at 14 weeks of age and by microCT analyses of bones from ...

Primary hyperparathyroidism is extremely rare in childhood and adolescence. Here we report a clinical case of a 15-year-3-month-old boy who began 2 years before with pain in his knees, genu varum, and fatigue. Physical examination showed severe genu valgum with an inter-malleolar distance of more than 30 cm. Biochemical tests showed hypercalcemia (12.2 mg/dl), hypophosphatemia (2.3 mg/ dl), hypercalciuria (6.4 mg/kg per day), high alkaline phosphatase (2812 IU/l), low 25-hydro...

Introduction: Despite the popularity of platet lysate (PL) treatments in orthopaedics, the mechanism of action and the effectiveness of this therapeutic tool is still controversial. So far, the activity of PL has been associated with different growth factors (GFs) released upon platelet degranulation. However, PL activity might also be due to the efficient cell to cell transport system of GF and other bioactive molecules by their encapsulation into exosomes. In this study, we ...

The regeneration of traumatized, damaged or lost bone is still a major clinical and socio-economical problem. Bone-tissue engineering approaches involve culturing mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) on scaffolds, in order to create a 3D microenvironment in which MSCs are able to generate functional tissues and regulate foreign body reaction to implanted construct. Excessive or non-resolving inflammation, characterized by the presence of monocytes, macrophages and giant cells, makes ...

Bone-tissue engineering approaches involve culturing mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) on 3D scaffolds designed to mimic the composition, structure, and biomechanics of the native bone matrix. One of the key challenges in bone–tissue engineering is to understand the host response to implantable engineered constructs. Macrophages play an important role in fracture healing and tissue repair and are mainly involved in the inflammatory response at the early stage upon scaffold im...

Introduction: Denosumab, a fully human monoclonal antibody to RANK ligand, effectively reduces bone resorption by inhibiting RANK-L binding to RANK. We aimed to evaluate the efficacy of denosumab in post-menopausal women, by monitoring the evolution of different parameters of bone health: T-score, morphometry, osteocalcin and β-Ctx.Methods: A 34 women with severe postmenopausal osteoporosis, characterized by multiple vertebral fractures wer...

Lysyl oxidase (LOX) catalyzes the cross-linking of collagens and elastin in the extracellular matrix, thereby regulating the tensile strength of many tissues, such as in bone. In cancer, LOX plays a critical role in facilitating tumor growth and metastasis formation in soft tissues. In this study, we first showed by immunohistochemistry using patients’ tumor specimens, that LOX was expressed in the desmoplastic tumor stroma of pairs of colorectal carcinomas and their matc...

Background: Genetic advances have led to the identification of 14 genes implicated in Osteogenesis imperfecta [OI], encompassing 96–98% of cases. Hallmark features of osteogenesis imperfecta include fractures from minimal trauma, bowing of the legs and growth retardation. Non-skeletal features include blue sclera, dentinogenesis imperfecta, hearing and refractory visual deficits, pulmonary dysfunction and cardiac valvular malformations. Classical radiographic features are...