Osteoporosis and Nutrition the Condition

Osteoporosis and Nutrition

The condition osteoporosis, or porous bones, presently affects 30 million people worldwide, 80% women, and can be fatal if left untreated. Often dubbed the "silent killer," in osteoporosis the bones become fragile and are more readily able to break. The disease can progress without notice until a bone breaks, most often in the hip, spine or wrist, which often requires hospitalization and major surgery, can impair a person's ability to walk unassisted and may cause prolonged or permanent disability or even death. Researchers have found that the best way to build strong bones, especially before the age of 30, is to get enough calcium and vitamin D, engage in regular weight bearing exercise and avoid smoking and excessive alcohol drinking. Coupled with the general bone loss that occurs after 35, the decreased estrogen levels in women after the menopause may cause loss of bone mass at a rate two to four times faster than prior to menopause, leading to osteoporosis, or porous bones.

Recently, however, a number of studies have found potassium to be an essential dietary mineral and electrolyte, or substance that dissociates into in solution and thus being capable of conducting electricity. Normal body function depends on tight regulation of potassium concentrations both inside and outside of cells. Potassium-rich foods, such as fruits and vegetables, are also rich in precursors to bicarbonate ions, which buffer acids in the body. Studies are suggesting that potassium can increase bone density and reduce the risk of osteoporosis.

Most often, the issue with osteoporosis is not having had enough calcium and vitamin D in the diet when young. The opposite is true, as well. According to research by Frassetto et. al., (2008) osteoporosis can also occur due to eating the wrong foods. To a significant degree, humans remain genetically adapted to the potassium-rich, sodium-chloride-poor, net base-producing diet of the hunter-gatherers. Now, however, a typical American diet contains sodium chloride far above evolutionary norms and potassium far below those norms. Foods commonly eaten also are metabolized more to noncarbonic acids than to organic bases. Diets rich in sodium chloride and that are net acid producing induce and sustain increased acidity of body fluid. As people age, the kidney's ability to excrete daily net acid loads declines, and leads to increased use of base stores, such as bone and skeletal muscle on a daily basis to alleviate the increasing baseline metabolic acidosis, which results in increased calciuria and net losses of body calcium.

Based on this information, it is recommended that Americans cut down on the high dietary sodium chloride load and the dietary net acid load of contemporary American diets. In addition to cutting sodium chloride intake, bananas are suggested foods for increasing potassium. Decreasing sodium chloride intake and increasing potassium- and bicarbonate-rich precursors may help the deteriorating skeleton as well as provide other potential health benefits.

Rafferty and Heaney (2008) also considered the value of potassium in their study. cohort was divided into halves based on median intakes for protein and calcium. Those with high protein intakes would have tended to be high in both meat and dairy, and those with high calcium intakes would have been high specifically in dairy. Potassium absorption was separately analyzed in those above and below the median intakes for the 2 nutrients. Potassium absorption remained above 90% on both sides of the protein and calcium medians (Table 1), and the small differences between them were not statistically significant. From the failure to find a difference at low and high meat and dairy intakes, it can be concluded that potassium is uniformly well absorbed regardless of dietary source.

A notable feature of the calcium economy is that adjustments of calcium absorption and excretion can diminish the impact of a high calcium intake or compensate for a low calcium intake. Quantifying various nutrient and whole-food effects on the calcium economy provides valuable data for public health professionals, clinicians, and nutritionists to counsel patients on achieving calcium balance; however, simply put, all true nutrient effects on the calcium economy can be managed either by reducing excess intake of the nutrient concerned or by increasing calcium intake. The most effective approach to improving calcium nutriture and preserving the calcium economy is to increase consumption of those foods naturally nutrient-rich in calcium, vitamin D, protein, phosphorus, and potassium. At present, the food source that best achieves such a naturally nutrient-rich designation is dairy.