Development and reproducibility of the bone loading history questionnaire

Area of Science:

• Orthopedics
• Bone Physiology
• Gerontology

Background:

• Assessing historical bone loading is crucial for understanding skeletal health.
• Bone loading units provide a quantitative measure of mechanical stress on the skeleton.
• Areal bone mineral density (aBMD) is a key indicator of bone strength and fracture risk.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a novel bone loading history questionnaire (BLHQ).
• To assess the reproducibility of the BLHQ in premenopausal women.
• To correlate bone loading units with aBMD and identify predictors of low aBMD.

Main Methods:

• Premenopausal women (N=80) completed the BLHQ twice over 4-6 weeks.
• Areal bone mineral density (aBMD) was measured using dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA).
• Intraclass correlation coefficients and logistic regression analyses were used to assess reliability and associations.

Main Results:

• The BLHQ demonstrated excellent test-retest reliability for spine and hip loading.
• Significant correlations were found between total spine/hip bone loading and femoral neck aBMD.
• Lowest tertile of recent hip bone loading increased odds for low femoral neck aBMD (OR=3.62).

Conclusions:

• The BLHQ is a reliable tool for assessing historical bone loading activity.
• Bone loading is moderately associated with femoral neck aBMD in premenopausal women.
• The BLHQ may help identify women at risk for low bone density before menopause.