Abstract
The purpose of this study was to assess the magnitude of the relationship between leisure physical activity and bone status as measured either by an AchillesTM ultrasound bone densitometer (QUS) or dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) in postmenopausal women. We studied 1162 French Canadian postmenopausal women, aged 33–84 years (mean age 58 years), for QUS parameters [broadband ultrasound attenuation (BUA), speed of sound (SOS), and stiffness index (SI)] measured at the right calcaneus, and bone mineral density (BMD) measured at the lumbar spine and femoral neck. Multivariate regression analyses revealed that leisure physical activity level was an independent predictor of the heel QUS parameters and of femoral neck BMD. No such association was observed for BMD of the lumbar spine. Heel QUS parameters (BUA, SOS, SI) and femoral neck BMD adjusted for interfering covariables showed a statistically significant difference between sedentary (less than three sessions/month) and active women (three or more sessions/week) (P ≤ 0.001). Furthermore, after adjusting each heel QUS parameters for the mean lumbar spine BMD value, the association observed between leisure physical activity and QUS remained significant. These results suggest that regular leisure physical activity could influence QUS parameters, independently of BMD, and that quantitative ultrasound could be a suitable outcome measure in exercise studies in postmenopausal women.
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Acknowledgements
The authors express their gratitude to all women who participated in this study and to the Centre Ménopause Québec personnel for their support. For the assistance in data collection, we thank Monique Longpré, Johanne Pelletier, Sophie Boucher and Stéphanie Seingier. Yves Giguère is supported by the Fonds de la Recherche en Santé du Québec (FRSQ) as a junior investigator, Feançois Rousseau is a FRSQ senior scientist and Sylvie Dodin is supported by FRSQ.
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Blanchet, C., Giguère, Y., Prud’homme, D. et al. Leisure Physical Activity is Associated with Quantitative Ultrasound Measurements Independently of Bone Mineral Density in Postmenopausal Women . Calcif Tissue Int 73, 339–349 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00223-002-1091-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00223-002-1091-9