Vitamin D and calcium can prevent hip fractures after 80

Hip and other bone fractures are epidemic among elderly women whose bones have been weakened by osteoporosis. A team of French scientists set out to see if some of these fractures could be prevented among 3,270 healthy ambulatory women living in 180 nursing homes or apartment houses. For 18 months, the researchers gave daily supplements of 1.2 grams of elemental calcium and 800 IU of vitamin D3 to half of the women and inactive pills to the others. At study's end, the number of hip fractures was 43% lower and the number of nonvertebral fractures (wrist, arm, and pelvis) 32% lower in women who had taken the supplements compared to those in the untreated group. In the December 3, 1992, New England Journal of Medicine, the researchers note that few side effects were associated with the supplements, indicating that this regimen is a safe way of preventing fractures that can rob elderly women of their health and mobility.