Abstract
Background:
Glucocorticoids taken orally increase the risk of fractures. It has been noted that a dose as low as 2.5 mg/day increases the risk of vertebral fracture. What is less clear is the possible influence of other risk factors for osteoporosis on the presence of non-vertebral fractures in patients taking glucocorticoids.Objectives:
A cross-sectional study, performed on 513 men and women from Spain, who were taking at least 7.5 mg/day of oral prednisone for a minimum of 3 months. A questionnaire was developed, through which information on risk factors was collected.Patients and Methods:
A cross-sectional study, performed on 513 men and women from Spain, who were taking at least 7.5 mg/day of oral prednisone for a minimum of 3 months. A questionnaire was developed, through which information on risk factors was collected.Results:
28.3% of the patients who were taking glucocorticoids at a daily oral dose of 7.5 mg/day for a minimum of 3 months had suffered at least one non-vertebral fracture. The risk increased with age, the number of months the glucocorticoids had been taken, the presence of falls in the last year and, above all, with a maternal history of hip fracture.Conclusions:
In patients taking oral glucocorticoids for over 3 months at doses higher than 7.5 mg/day of prednisone or equivalent, the prevalence of non-vertebral fractures was 28.3%. Some risk factors associated with the presence of these fractures were identified. The duration of glucocorticoid use appears to be more strongly related to the presence of non-vertebral fractures than the daily dose.Full Text
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Copyright
© 2012, Author(s). This open-access article is available under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0) International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which allows for unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original work is properly cited.