Dried plum reverses bone loss in an osteopenic rat model of osteoporosis

Abstract

Objective: We previously reported the efficacy of dried plum (Prunus domestica L.) in preventing ovariectomy-induced bone loss in a rat model of osteoporosis and improving bone biomarkers in postmenopausal women. The present study evaluated whether dried plum was able to restore bone mass in osteopenic ovariectomized rats.Design: Ninety-day-old Sprague-Dawley rats were either sham-operated (Sham; one group) or ovariectomized (Ovx; five groups) and were fed a standard diet for 40 days to establish bone loss and subsequently experimental treatments were initiated. Sham, Ovx control, and Ovx + 17b-estradiol (E 2 ; 10 mg/kg body weight per day) animals continued to receive the standard diet, whereas the remaining three Ovx groups received the following dietary treatments: Ovx + 5% dried plum (low dose), Ovx + 15% dried plum (medium dose), and Ovx + 25% dried plum (high dose). After 60 days, blood and bone specimens were collected for analyses.Results: Dried plum, as low as 5%, was effective in restoring femoral and tibial bone density. Dried plum increased lumbar bone density as well, with HD achieving a statistical significance. The increase in femoral bone density of dried plum-fed rats resulted in improved bone quality as indicated by 6.9% and 6.0% improvement in overall yield and ultimate force, respectively. Varying doses of dried plum were also able to significantly improve trabecular microarchitectural properties in comparison with ovariectomized controls.Conclusions: The improvement in biomechanical properties of long bones due to dried plum, in part, may be due to the favorable microstructural changes as evident by enhanced tibial bone volume and connectivity. Loss of bone volume accompanied by loss of trabecular connectivity is generally believed to be an irreversible process, but our observations suggest that dried plum improves trabecular microstructure of tibia after losses have already occurred.

A Systematic Review on the Health Effects of Plums (Prunus domestica and Prunus salicina)

“…The results from this in vitro experiment by Bu et al (2008) has also been confirmed in animal studies (Deyhim et al, 2005;Franklin et al, 2006;Bu et al, 2007;Smith et al, 2014a). Among these, the study by Smith et al (2014a) is slightly different in that unlike the other studies that studied longer term effects of dried plum on systemic biochemical markers of bone metabolism and alteration in gene expression as the main outcome measure, their main objective was to understand the mechanism of action by which dried plum altered bone metabolism.…”

“…Restoration of bone mineral density by two higher doses and bone turnover suppression (Deyhim et al, 2005) USA Dried plum (P.…”

Melittophilous Mode of Pollination Predominates in European Plum (Prunus domestica L.) in the Semi-Arid Environment of Northwest India

“…Prunes improve the liver function (Ahmed et al, 2010b), bone health (Hooshmand and Arjmandi, 2009. ) and increase bone mass, prevents osteoporosis (Deyhim et al, 2005;Bu et al, 2008), enhances the resistance to fungal infection (El-Kereamy et al, 2011), is anticancerous (Fujii et al, 2006) and anti hypercholestremia (Tinker et al, 1991).…”

Feeding Orange Pulp Improved Bone Quality in a Rat Model of Male Osteoporosis

“…OVX_25% dried plum also increased lumbar bone density significantly. Interestingly, dried plum fed in varying amounts improved trabecular microarchitectural properties, including bone volume and connectivity, in comparison with OVX after bone loss occurred (64).…”