We live in a world where we can access unlimited amounts of information in seconds. The problem is, that a lot of misinformation tends to go along with it.
So when it comes to your bone health, who can you trust?
This week I wanted to give you a list of bone health resources that you may find helpful when searching for information or finding answers to your questions. You may have heard of one or two of these, but I guarantee you haven’t heard of them all.
5 Bone Health Resources You Need to Know
The NNT (Number-Needed-to-Treat): “To offer a measurement of the impact of a medicine or therapy by estimating the number of patients that need to be treated in order to have an impact on one person. The concept is statistical, but intuitive, for we know that not everyone is helped by a medicine or intervention – some benefit, some are harmed, and some are unaffected. The NNT tells us how many of each.”
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- Pros: This is my personal favorite. The NNT provides a fantastic resource as they review the studies of medical interventions and present the information in an easily consumable and concise way. For instance, the rating system is borrowed from the traditional stoplight where you are provided with a color-coded summary.
- Cons: They have a limited database of reviewed studies when it comes to bone health.
National Osteoporosis Foundation (NOF) Inspire Forum:“The National Osteoporosis Foundation support community connects patients, family, friends and caregivers for support and inspiration.”
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- Pros: This online community is a place where you can go to read, share and participate in discussions regarding bone health. This community provides support, attempts to answer each other’s questions and gives guidance to one another.
- Cons: While this community is a great resource to talk to fellow bone health sufferers, they cannot take the place of doctors and bone health experts. Some of the information is great, some of it is biased and not science backed. The forum and the NOF are also influenced by big pharma. (See their corporate advisory board link at the bottom of the site.)
AskaPatient.com:”There is more to know than what the ads say. Learn from the experience of real people who have taken drug treatments. Share your side effects or success stories. Take control of your health by being informed and asking questions. AskaPatient provides tools for the empowered patient.”
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- Pros: AskaPatient allows you to share your experience, no matter how positive or negative it is. By doing so, AskaPatient gives you actual accounts of side effects or success stories of drug treatments. AskaPatient has a specific category where you can see what others have said about their bone drug experiences.
- Cons: The reviews on AskaPatient have extremes on either side (extremely positive or extremely negative) and may reflect review bias.
[VIDEO] Dr. Bauer Talks Osteoporosis: Doug Bauer is an M.D. who has 28 years of experience and is board certified in Internal Medicine. This video called Osteoporosis: Update on Diagnosis and Treatment discusses osteoporosis treatment options, exercise, supplements and more.
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- Pros: Dr. Bauer gives a balanced presentation and discusses the benefits of exercise in a way you probably haven’t heard of before. Hint: Weight-bearing exercise does not increase bone density like we thought.
- Cons: It is a 90-minute video so if you don’t have time to watch it in one sitting, try breaking it up into 30-minute intervals. Dr. Bauer also comes across as pro big pharma which may be due to having worked for pharmaceutical companies in the past. His presentation is also light on natural ways of treating osteoporosis.
The Book “Your Bones”: “Your Bones” is an in-depth analysis of everything bone health. The author, Lara Pizzorno is an M.A., L.M.T. and a member of the American Medical Writers Associations. She has 25+ years of experience writing for physicians and the public.
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- Pros: This updated version contains information on vitamin K2, strontium, calcium supplementation options and bone-busting patent medicines.
- Cons: There is a lot of information! At the end of every chapter there is a well-explained chapter summary. My advice: read the summary chapter first and then go back and read the chapters that are most relevant to you.
Thank you for reading!
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