Prevalence of Osteoporosis and Its Correlation With Common Secondary Risk Factors in Population from Rural Areas of South India

Background. Osteoporosis is a common metabolic disorder characterised by decreased bone mass and weakened micro-architecture of bone tissue. After 50 years of age, one in three women and one in five men experience osteoporotic fractures. This is projected to cause a yearly loss of 5.8 million healthy life years to disability. The number of patients who attend the outpatient clinic and emergency department of Sanjay Gandhi Institute of Trauma and Orthopaedics with fragility fractures has been increasing, hence to know the prevalence of osteoporosis in the general population who were asymptomatic, we decided to conduct a study in the rural areas of south India.

Aims: 1) to estimate the prevalence of osteoporosis among the population above 50 years in rural areas of south India; 2) to determine the correlation between common secondary risk factors for osteoporosis like tobacco consumption, alcohol, diabetes, and hypertension.

Results. The prevalence of osteoporosis in the rural population was more in females at 42.2%, whereas the males had a prevalence of 32.5%. Among the population with habits of tobacco consumption and alcohol consumption, the prevalence was 78% and 30.6% respectively. 20.2% of non-smokers and 39.7% of non-alcoholics were osteoporotic. Among the population with comorbidities, 53.6% of diabetes and 55.4% of hypertensives were osteoporotic. 33.7% of non-diabetics were osteoporotic, and 29.5% of hypertensives were osteoporotic. The correlation between osteoporosis and the individual risk factors ranged between weak negative to moderately positive (r = -0.2 to 0.5). The correlation between the combination of all the four risk factors and osteoporosis is weakly positive (r = 0.339), which is highly significant (p<0.001).

Conclusion. Overall, the findings of this study suggest that addictive habits such as tobacco and alcohol consumption may have a significant impact on bone health, with a higher prevalence of osteopenia and osteoporosis observed in individuals with these habits. Comorbidities such as diabetes and hypertension were also found to be associated with a higher prevalence of osteoporosis. These findings emphasize the importance of early detection and prevention of addictive habits and comorbidities to reduce the risk of osteopenia and osteoporosis. Furthermore, the study highlights the need for further research to fully understand the complex relationships between sociodemographic factors, addictive habits, comorbidities, and bone health.