[Relationship between renal function and bone mineral density in postmenopausal women that undergo bone mass...

As osteoporosis and renal insufficiency are two prevalent pathologies in the aging population we decided to evaluate retrospectively the renal function (estimated by formula) in postmenopausal women who came to our Institute for bone mass determination to establish the relationship between them. Thus, we studied 300 postmenopausal women with a mean age of 66.9 +/- 6.8 years who had a bone densitometry performed; we chose total femur bone mineral density (TFBMD) for defining osteopenia and osteoporosis as this measurement included substantial amounts of both trabecular and cortical bone; osteopenia/osteoporosis was diagnosed using T score criteria recommended by the WHO. We also measured BMD at the femoral neck. Renal function was estimated by the Cockcroft-Gault formula using serum creatinine determination. We found osteoporosis in 61 patients (20.3%). Of them, el 81.9% have renal insufficiency (estimated creatinine clearance-ECrC < or = 60 ml/min), compared to 54% of 239 women who had normal BMD/osteopenia (p < 0.001). Six of 61 (9.8%) women with osteoporosis had severe renal insufficiency (ECrC < or = 36 ml/min) versus 4/239 (1.6%) women with normal BMD/osteopenia (p = 0.001). Women with osteoporosis were older, and had a significantly lower weight and ECrC compared to patients without osteoporosis (ECrC 52 +/- 11 ml/min vs 59 +/- 12 ml/min; p < 0.0001). We found a significant positive correlation between TFBMD and ECrC (r = 0.389) as well as with weight (r = 0.422) and a negative correlation between age and ECrCE (r = -0.51) and with TFBMD (r = -0.22). In the multiple regression analysis only weight continued to correlate significantly with TFBMD (Beta = 0.344). When FNBMD was considered as the dependent variable, we found a significantly negative correlation with age (r = -0.30) and significantly positive correlations with height (r = 0. 16), weight (r = 0.33) and ECcr (r = 0.39). In the multiple regression analysis only age (Beta = -0.20) and weight (Beta = 0.20) continued having an independent correlation FNBMD. We conclude that our data confirm that there exists a substantial prevalence of renal insufficiency, even severe, among patients with densitometric osteoporosis that should be kept in mind when one is considering the prescription of medications as bisphosphonates that have renal clearance, so as not to jeopardize the efficacy and the security of these drugs.