Daily use of whole-body vibration did not improve bone-mineral density.

Wondering about getting one of those expensive platforms to rapidly vibrate your body to build bone density? Think again! Canadian researchers found no siginificant difference between women who received 20 minutes of whole-body vibration (WBV) everyday for one year compared to no WBV. All received calcium and vitamin D supplements. There were 202 postmenopausal women in this study.

PositiveTip: Keep up your daily weight-bearing physical activities. No short-cuts to strong bones have been found yet!

Regular consumption of cola increases the risk of low bone-mineral density in women.

More than 2500 people in the Framingham Osteoporosis Study with an average age of 60 were given bone-mineral density measurements of the spine and and three different hip sites. In the women, cola drinks were associated with lower bone mineral density at all three hip sites. The principle investigator, Katherine Tucker said, "The more cola that women drank, the lower their bone mineral density was. However we did not see an association with bone mineral density loss for women who drank carbonated beverages that were not cola."

Vegetarianism is not a serious risk factor for osteoporotic fracture.

Bone health has been a concern to those who choose a vegetarian diet. A newly published meta-analysis of nine earlier studies on bone-mineral density (BMD) and vegetarian diets is cause to breathe a bit easier. While vegetarians and vegans have a slightly lower BMD (4% and 6% respectively) than omnivores, the size of the difference is very small and "clinically insignificant". An accompanying editorial stated, "it can be concluded that vegetarianism is not a serious risk factor for osteoporotic fracture."