A 4-year treatment with clodronate plus calcium and vitamin D supplements does not improve bone mass in primary biliary cirrhosis.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc, published as a clinical trial.

The researchers conducted a prospective study in primary biliary cirrhosis with a view to optimizing the rationale for the medical treatment of bone loss.

Why It Was Studied

International guidelines for managing osteoporosis in cirrhosis or severe cholestasis indicate a <-2.5 t-score as a cut-off for medical treatment, while no treatment is recommended in the case of osteopenia (t-scores ranging from -1.0 to -2.5).

Who Took Part

PubMed indexes the participants as middle-aged adults and older adults, women only.

All naïve post-menopausal women with primary biliary cirrhosis were enrolled in the study.

How the Study Was Run

Bone metabolism was evaluated by measuring 25-hydroxy-vitamin D, parathyroid hormone, osteocalcin.

What Was Measured

International guidelines for managing osteoporosis in cirrhosis or severe cholestasis indicate a <-2.5 t-score as a cut-off for medical treatment, while no treatment is recommended in the case of osteopenia (t-scores ranging from -1.0 to -2.5).

PubMed files the paper under topics including Bone Density, Bone Density Conservation Agents, Bone Resorption, Calcium, Clodronic Acid, Dietary Supplements and Liver Cirrhosis, Biliary.

What This Means in Plain Language

This is a clinical trial of Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc.

Its findings take up roughly 6 sentences of the abstract and are left out here on purpose; the source paper is the place to read them.

The publication is from 2007 (Digestive and liver disease : official journal of the Italian Society of Gastroenterology and the Italian Association for the Study of the Liver), a journal based in Netherlands.

More context: the Vitamin D, K2, Magnesium and Zinc compound page, all human trials.