Recent research presented at the IOF World Congress on Osteoporosis in Toronto indicates consuming calcium in food might be a better method to protect bones than taking supplemental calcium in pill form. The International Osteoporosis Foundation (IOF) estimates that one out of three women over 50 years of age will experience bone fractures due to the osteoporosis, as will one out of five men.
Starting out with maximized bone density lowers the risk of osteoporosis, a disease characterized by low bone mass and structural deterioration of bone tissue. As bones age, they lose calcium, making them prone to osteoporosis and fractures.
“We found that people who take just dietary calcium, or a combination of dietary calcium with supplements, have better bone density than those who take supplements alone,” says Dr. Reina Armamento-Villareal of the Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. “So we think dietary sources are better than supplemental sources by themselves.”
The study looked at three groups of women: one received calcium from supplements only; another got it from food only; and the third obtained calcium from supplements as well as food. Dietary sources were associated with high levels of active estrogen metabolites in urine. This is important for bone health, because estrogen builds bone mass during youth and prevents bone loss during aging. "And we believe that if urinary levels of estrogen metabolites are high then estrogen levels in the body are also high," Armamento-Villareal explains.
Armamento-Villareal concludes that dietary calcium appears to be optimally absorbed by the body. But she cautions the study didn’t reflect lifetime-intake patterns, so some uncertainties about the long-term differences between dietary and supplemental calcium remain. "Our future plan is to conduct a two- to three-year study comparing their effects during growing years to determine if one source of calcium is better than the other in building bones," she says.
