Guest blog post by Suzanne Morris
Medical writer: Concrete Medical Writing
What? I remember simultaneously saying it and realizing how scripted it sounded. “Mom broke her leg,” my sister repeated. She didn’t know any more than that - she’d heard briefly from our dad, who, with our mother, had traveled to Lisbon for a week’s stay before the family was to gather in Colorado for the 2017 holidays. Only in piecing together the subsequent abbreviated reports from my dad did I then realize that this was likely a pathologic fracture - my mother had been diagnosed with osteoporosis years prior to their travel. Upon entering a hotel dining room, her femur spontaneously fractured.
By Christmas Day, my sister and I were able to chat with our Lisbon hospital bed-bound mother, relieved that she had benefitted from Portuguese generosity (strangers with hospitalized family members had thought to also bring our mother holiday goodies). She was to remain bed-bound for over a month before being released to travel back to the US. Not long after arriving home, it was discovered that her contralateral femur was bowed with a hairline fracture, indicating the prophylactic insertion of a rod (which was recommended and performed.)
My mother is now getting around well, taking routine walks around her neighborhood for exercise, but is (understandably) hesitant to travel. Having earned a master’s degree in nutrition, she has been aware of the importance of calcium in women’s diets and urgently conveyed this to us when we were still children. So she was well-informed when she first received a diagnosis of osteoporosis. She was treated with a bisphosphonate but was one of the rare patients who experienced what is considered a low-risk, atypical femoral fracture (AFF) following long-term bisphosphonate therapy. (Panagiotis, 2017). Her treatment has since been adjusted, and she is hopeful that her current therapy will improve her bone density.
Recently, I learned that I have osteopenia, I am now doing what I can to avoid progression to osteoporosis. Namely, I focus on low-impact weight-bearing and stretching exercises six days a week and eat a varied diet high in beans, vegetables, fruits, and nuts. There is the additional comorbidity factor of my having rheumatoid arthritis, which is a prognostic factor in osteoporosis development. There is also the coffee addition, which I am still working on. But given the multitude of factors that point to likely future osteoporosis and fracture, I realize that I am going to have to bring some heavy healthy lifestyle reinforcements.
Suzanne Morris lives in Orlando, Florida and Mom Judith lives in Denver, Colorado.
References
Anagnostis P, Paschou SA, Mintziori G, et al. Drug holidays from bisphosphonates and denosumab in postmenopausal osteoporosis: EMAS position statement, Mauritas. 2017 Jul;101:23-30.
National Osteoporosis Foundation website accessed Sep 14, 2019.
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