Antidepressants Linked to Fracture Risk
Once again, HealthyDay News has given me some interesting information from the January 22nd edition of the Archives of Internal Medicine. This time it has to do with the fact that both male & female patients taking an antidepressant (SSRIs such as Prozac and Paxil in particular) have twice the risk of fracturing bones! “There is good scientific evidence that serotonin is involved in bone physiology, and if you alter the system, you can get low bone density,” Goltzman said.
For five years, Goltzman and his fellow researches followed information from 137 patients (average age of 65) who took antidepressants. He measured the bone density of them as their baseline and they were tracked for five years. Every year patients reported any fractures they incurred and how they happened. Goltzman learned that fractured forearms, ankles and feet were high as well as rib, back, femur & hip fracturing. Perhaps this is due to an increased risk in falling (my meds say “may cause dizziness!).
Dr. Robert P Heany, a professor of medicine a the Osteoporosis Research Center at Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska does claims the study still does not prove that there is a correlation between SSRIs and fractures. “These findings are hard to interpret,” said Dr. Robert P. Heaney, a professor of medicine at the . “Increased fracture risk has been associated with depression for years,” he added. A study of depressed patients taking only SSRIs compared to depressed patients taking other medications needs to be done before this can be settled. “Then you could see if it was the depression causing the fractures or if it were the SSRIs. It may not be the SSRI at all,” he said.
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