Age-dependent bone loss in the femur in a medieval population

Metacarpal radiogrammetry: a useful indicator of bone loss throughout the skeleton?

“…The results for the metacarpal cortical thickness were weak, negative and non-significantly correlated with the femoral cortical thickness (r Z ÿ0.058). These results are similar to those of a previous study using medieval skeletons [29], whereby correlations between metacarpal and femoral cortical index were weak for both males and females. It is likely that these differences stem from the fact that femoral cortical bone morphology undergoes more complex changes throughout life in response to weight bearing compared to the non-weight bearing metacarpal cortical bone.…”

“…The effect of the combined male and female femoral cortical thickness measures owing to small sample sizes in the current study is likely to have contributed to the poor correlation with the metacarpal cortical thickness. However, given the poor relationships identified previously by Mays et al [29] for both males and females separately, the poor correlation in the present study cannot wholly be explained by the combined dataset. Femoral cortical bone loss with age does not occur in a linear fashion [6,18] which may also help to explain the poor result.…”

Massa Óssea Cortical do Fémur numa Coleção Esquelética de Referência Portuguesa

“…In males, cortical bone in the femur is not associated with BMD neck . Female results are similar to the associations between cortical bone and BMD stated by Mays et al (1998), with a weaker association in males. Ives and Brickley (2005) reported a non-significant association between BMD neck and metacarpal cortical index in a pooled sample from both sexes.…”

Osteoporosis among ancient Egyptians

“…Indeed, post-menopausal women are characterised by loss of trabecular bone at rates two-to three-fold greater than age-matched controls (Riggs, 1991). Similar results were reported in other studies (Garn, 1970;Ruff & Hayes, 1982, 1983Martin et al, 1985;Lees et al, 1993;Kneissel et al, 1994;Agarwal & Grynpas, 1996;Mays, 1996Mays, , 2000Mays et al, 1998;Brickley & Howell, 1999;McEwan et al, 2004). Different studies have investigated the issue of age in relation to osteoporosis, in contemporary (Levis & Altman, 1998) and in ancient populations (Brickley & Howell, 1999).…”