| Budget Amount *help |
¥1,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,300,000)
Fiscal Year 1998: ¥300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥300,000)
Fiscal Year 1997: ¥300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥300,000)
Fiscal Year 1996: ¥700,000 (Direct Cost: ¥700,000)
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| Research Abstract |
Bone density is considered to be the main factor of bone strength, but its reduction is not a sole factor involved in the bone fragility of osteoporosis. Alterations in trabecular microarchitecture and bone quality also play an important role in defining the biological competence of the skeleton. Recently, attention has been focused on the measurement that provide information about not only bone density but also trabecular microarchitecture and bone quality. Peripheral quantitative computed tomography (pQCT) is a recently popularized densitometry system, which allows for a true volumetric density measurement and provides precise geometric information in three dimensions. In this study we assessed the performance of pQCT in measuring the bone architecture in addition to BMD, and evaluated the utility of deriving measures in the animal and human study. The accuracy of pQCT was equivalent and its precision was superior to the other densitometry systems. In addition to BMD, pQCT provided the cortical bone density , cortical geometric parameters, and texture parameters that reflected trabecular microarchitecture. The use of the ferret as a small animal model for the study of bone loss was investigated using pQCT, and the result suggested that the ferret may offer a new model with potential utility for the skeletal research, including the investigation of immobilization- and weightlessness-induced bone loss. The pQCT measurements of lower extremities in young athletes revealed that the increase of bone mass was attributable to the endocortical hypertrophy and the increase of cortical density. In osteoporotic women, trabecular BMD and texture measures in metaphyseal sites were largely decreased compared to those of young women or age matched controls. However, none of the indices derived from pQCT measurements could increase the diagnostic efficacy over the lumbar BMD in the diagnosis of the vertebral fracture or osteoporosis.
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