5. FRAX

It's all about fractures.  Osteoporsis means increased risk of broken bones.  A niece recently broke her arm when her ATV rolled.  I supposed if I had been there instead of her, I might have had several, more serious fractures.  But who's to say?

Well, FRAX says something.  FRAX is the Fracture Risk Assessment tool developed by WHO and British researchers in 2008, using large populations, linking known fractures with demographic and clinical data.  

I went to the FRAX website, entered the requested information, and came up with a prediction that within the next 10 years I have a  27% risk of a major osteoporotic fracture and 16% risk of a hip fracture.  

Not bad, that means this year I have a 1 out of 37 chance of a major fracture. Returning to the tool and plugging in a normal bone density result, I would have only a 1 out of 167 risk of a major fracture.  To be dramatic, my osteoporosis means almost a 500% increase in risk of a major fracture this year. 

But frankly, it's not so much the major fracture I'm worried about, but rather the insidious microfractures that I'll talk about in my next post.