Tips for Building and Maintaining Strong Bones

Our bones are meant to carry us through a lifetime. Unfortunately, poor nutrition and lack of exercise, over time, can take their toll on bone mass. If you're concerned about bone health, here are some facts and tips about osteoporosis you should know about from the Center for Bone Health and Montefiore Medical Center in New York:

• Your body stores almost all of its calcium in the bones, which acts as a calcium bank. You deposit calcium daily and your body withdraws what it needs each day. The amount of daily calcium you need varies according to your age.   

  Stage of Life	Daily Calcium Requirements
  1-3 years	500 mg.
  4-8 years	800 mg.
  9-18 years	1,300 mg.
  Pregnancy  & lactation	1,000 - 1,200 mg.
  Adult women	1,000 mg.
  Post-menopause on hormones	1,200 mg.
  Post-menopause without hormones	1,500 mg.

• Cottage cheese is a poor source of calcium. A one-cup serving of cottage cheese has only 138 milligrams (mg) of calcium.  A cup of non-fat yogurt has 450 mg of calcium. Hard cheeses have varying calcium content. an ounce of processed American has 130 mg of calcium; parmesan has 335 mg of calcium; Swiss cheese, 270 mg per ounce.
   

• Low-fat dairy products often have more calcium than whole-milk products. Non-fat yogurt has 450 mg per cup, while whole milk yogurt has 274 mg per cup. There is 337 mg of calcium in a half-cup of ricotta, compared to 257 mg in whole ricotta. The reason is that non-fat dairy products are often fortified with dry milk solids. Read labels to get information about how much calcium is contained in foods.
   

• Some foods and beverages interfere with calcium absorption. These include heavily salted foods such as bacon, salami, smoked salmon, prepared soups, salty snacks, and other processed food. You should consume less than 4,000 mg of sodium a day.
   

• Cola has phosphoric acid, which blocks calcium absorption, and caffeine, which actually depletes calcium. Excess alcohol consumption damages bones.
   

• Sun is good for your bones. About 15 minutes a day of sunlight without sunscreen will produce all of the vitamin D you need. A minimum of 400 IU of vitamin D each day is essential for your body to absorb calcium. Ensure your calcium supplement contains enough vitamin D for those days when the sun isn't shining or you can't get outside.
   

• Osteoporosis begins in the teen years. Girls achieve 42 percent of their total bone mass between the ages of 12 and 18, yet 90 percent of girls don't get enough calcium. Beginning at age 9, children should get 1,300 mg of calcium a day in their diet.
   

• Exercise helps protect you against osteoporosis. The best kinds of exercise are weight-bearing activities such as running, jumping, and lifting.
   

• There are various warning signs of osteoporosis. Many older women have fractured spines, but are unaware of it because they don't feel or hear the bone crack. Height loss, back pain, a protruding abdomen and a dowager's hump on the back are all signs that an older woman has suffered a fractured spine. Brittle teeth may also be a sign of osteoporosis.
   

• Early menopause, estrogen-inhibiting drugs such as Depo-Provera, late puberty, irregular periods, or other menstrual disorders may put women at higher risk of developing osteoporosis.
   

• Some medications such as kidney disease, lupus, and an overactive thyroid gland also increase the risk of osteoporosis.

Source: Montefiore Medical Center, Bronx, New York, August 2003 News Release.

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