A study of risk factors and T-score variability in Romanian women with postmenopausal osteoporosis

Background: the purpose of this study was to analyse the prevalence of postmenopausal osteoporosis risk factors and to analyse the t-score variability in spine and hip according to the associated risk factors. methods: this is a retrospective study (2003-2007) including 177 female patients with postmenopausal osteoporosis. the patients were separated in seven groups according to the number of risk factors per case. the t-score was com-pared between this groups using unpaired t-student test. results: the most frequent risk factor was early menopause (44.63%),followed by low consumption of dairy prod-ucts (37.29%),coffee consumption (25.99%),sedentary lifestyle (20.9%),smoking (19.21%),delayed menarche (15.25%),low body mass index (10.71%),nulliparity (7.91%),alcohol consumption (0.56%). the maximum number of risk factors per case was six. the t-score decreased with increasing number of risk factors. t-score differences are statistically significant when comparing cases with 6 risk factors to cases with 5 risk factors (p=0.0315 in spine; p=0.0088 in hip),4 risk factors (p=0.0076 in spine; p=0.043 in hip),3 risk factors (p<0.0001 in spine; p=0.0205 in hip),2 risk factors (p=0.0012 in spine; p<0.0001 in hip),a single risk factor (p<0.001 in spine and hip) and no risk factor (p=0.0075 in spine; p=0.0006 in hip). conclusion: association of several risk factors leads to decrease of t-score so being able to avoid any such factors may contribute to a better bone mineral density. this could be achieved by the education of female population regard-ing postmenopausal osteoporosis risk factors,followed by adopting an appropriate lifestyle and diet.