Bone Abstracts

Background: Orally administered ibandronate is an effective agent in the treatment of postmenopausal osteoporosis. There are only scarce data regarding its use in children with impaired bone health.Objectives: To evaluate the effect of oral ibandronate on bone health in osteoporotic children and adolescents.Patients, materials and methods: We enrolled six patients (all boys; mean age 15.7±3.8 years; range 8–18 years) with...

Background: Hypocalcaemia can be manifested by paresthesia, muscle cramps, muscle weakness, syncope, convulsions and even severe psychomotor retardation. Suchs symptoms can be initially considered as signs of epilepsy. Fahr’s disease is neurological disorder with neuropsychic changes and convulsions. Fahr’s disease is characterized by central nervous system calcifications caused by mutations in SLC20A2 gene, encoding sodium-dependent phosphate transporter 2 (PiT-2) t...

Background: Association between high serum homocysteine (S-Hcy) levels and low bone mineral density (BMD) and increased fracture risk in postmenopausal women has been repeatedly documented. There are scarce data concerning S-Hcy and bone health in children and adolescents.Patients and methods: We assessed S-Hcy levels in 37 children and adolescents (22 boys and 15 girls; mean age 13.9±3.5 years) with prevalent low-energy trauma fractures (mean 3.3&#...

Objectives: To evaluate the effect of oral ibandronate on bone health in osteoporotic children and adolescents, as there are only scarce data regarding its use in pediatric population.Patients, materials, methods: We enrolled seven patients (six boys; one girl; mean age 15.3±3.8 years; range 8–18 years) with low bone mineral density (BMD) (mean 0.746±0.141 g/cm2; i.e. −3.3±1.5 S.D. z-score) and...

Background: Treatment with orally administered ibandronate is an effective way to increase bone mineral density (BMD) and reduce fracture rate in post-menopausal women and in men with osteoporosis. There are only very few reports concerning ibandronate therapy in children/adolescents, and in patients with osteogenesis imperfecta (OI), as bisphosphonates are off-label drugs in pediatrics.Case presentation: We present two patients with OI type I (14 year o...

Background: Neonatal hypocalcemia is defined as S-Ca <2 mmol/l in fullterm newborns and <1.75 mmol/l in preterm newborns. Neonatal hypocalcemia is either early onset (<3 days of age) or late onset (>3 days of age). Newborns with hypocalcemia are often asymptomatic, but mays present with hypotonia, apnea, poor feeding, jitteriness, seizures, cardiac failure. Signs of hypocalcemia rarely occur unless S-Ca drops below 1.75 mmol/l.Case presen...

Background: Idiopathic infantile hypercalcemia (IIH) is a rare disorder caused by CYP24A1 loss-of-function mutation, resulting in impaired degradation of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D3. Typical signs include muscle hypotonia, dehydration, failure to thrive, psychomotor retardation, constipation, nephrocalcinosis. IIH should be distinguished from other causes of hypercalcemia in infancy. Treatment includes low calcium diet, glucocorticoids, furosemide, calcitonin. Pamidron...

Background: Transient hyperphosphatasemia of infancy and early childhood (THI) is a benign, usually accidentally detected condition characterized by transiently increased activity of serum alkaline phosphatase (S-ALP), its bone or liver isoform, in children under five years of age, without signs of metabolic bone disease or hepatopathy. When encountered in a child with either chronic bone, liver or kidney disease, THI might concern the physician. We present a patient with urol...

Background: Hypercalcemia in childhood is rare, can be of various origin and might go unrecognized until severe signs appear. We demonstrate hypercalcemia of different causes in two infants.Case no 1.: 5-month old girl with failure to thrive, constipation, muscle hypotonia, dehydration, where total calcaemia peaked to 4.25 mmol/l. Low calcium diet, application of glucocorticoids and furosemide resulted in a drop in calcaemia to values below 3 mmol/l and ...

Objectives: Cross-sectional studies show that exercise may have positive effects on bone outcomes in youth. However, there is no evidence from longitudinal studies, which type of sports can induce improvements in bone acquisition in adolescent athletes. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the longitudinal differences in bone acquisition and bone metabolism between adolescent males participating in osteogenic (football) and non-osteogenic (swimming, cycling) sports compa...