Teriparatide for treatment of patients with bisphosphonate-associated atypical fracture of the femur

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial paper looks at Teriparatide.

Little clinical data are available on the use of teriparatide for the treatment of bisphosphonate-associated atypical femur fractures (AFF).

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 13 women taking part.

The age groups tagged for this paper are older adults, women only.

This randomized pilot clinical trial included 13 women with an AFF who were randomized to immediate teriparatide vs a delay of 6 months.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized and pilot study.

The women were allocated by chance, so the Teriparatide group and the comparison group should start out alike.

It is described as a pilot, a small early test of whether a larger Teriparatide study would be practical.

The timeline in the abstract includes 12 months.

All were followed for 12 months on teriparatide.

The primary outcomes included individual and composite measures of radiologic bone healing (scored 1 point [no healing] to 4 points [complete healing]) at 6 and 12 months.

Secondary outcomes included bone mineral density of the unfractured contralateral hip, spine, 1/3 distal radius, and adverse events.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Bone Density, Bone Density Conservation Agents, Diphosphonates, Femoral Fractures, Fracture Healing, Fractures, Spontaneous and Osteoporosis, Postmenopausal.

Author keywords: Atypical femur fracture, Bisphosphonate, Bone mineral density and Teriparatide.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized and pilot study of Teriparatide in 13 women over 12 months.

With fewer than 40 people, it is a small study, so it is better read as an early signal for further research than as a settled answer.

Results are reported in around 5 sentences of the abstract; we leave them to the paper itself rather than summarise them.

The publication is from 2018 (Osteoporosis international : a journal established as result of cooperation between the European Foundation for Osteoporosis and the National Osteoporosis Foundation of the USA), a journal based in England.

More context: the Teriparatide compound page, all human trials.