World health organizations web-based tool for osteoporosis called frax

Patients with normal bone density without fractures do not benefit from treatment. We need to identify and focus on those patients at the greatest risk of osteoporotic fracture and offer them treatment.

The FRAX tool is based on , patient years of follow-up and has been validated in several large studies. Use of age, height, weight, and risk factors such as family history, presence of inflammatory arthritis, previous fractures, steroid use, smoking and alcohol allows the calculation of 10 year fracture risk. The scientific group defined osteoporosis based on bone mineral density BMD. A standardized score, called T-score , comparing BMD to average values for young healthy women is used to define the categories.

These criterion applied only to white postmenopausal women since the research data was primarily limited to this group. In addition, diagnosis could only be based on three skeletal sites of measurement: lumbar spine, hip, or forearm. Advances in research demonstrated limitations in the original definition. Defining fracture risk by BMD alone did not capture the majority of people at risk for breaking a bone. As for what Dr.

John Kanis at Sheffield University, has extensive financial ties to companies selling osteoporosis drugs. The FRAX tool is seen by some independent researchers as a way to get more people to take these drugs. That study, called the SCOOP trial , is scheduled to be published soon and is likely to be promoted and publicized to journalists in ways that the WHO editorial clearly was not. Please note , comments are no longer published through this website.

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Abstract Osteoporosis-related fractures low-trauma or fragility fractures cause substantial disability, health care costs, and mortality among postmenopausal women and older men. Publication types Research Support, Non-U.