A class of osteoporosis drugs appears to increase the risk of bone fracture, the Food and Drug Administration cautioned doctors and patients Wednesday, October 14, 2010. The agency has requested a labeling change in the Warnings and Precautions section of all bisphosphonate products used to treat the disease that makes bones weak and more likely to break.

The drugs must also now have a medication guide to alert patients of the risk. This is not, however, a box

Not just a single vitamin, Vitamin K is a family of fat-soluble vitamins with similar structures, but different metabolic properties. We think of Vitamin K1 as the coagulation vitamin, because of its role in the blood-clotting process. Americans can get enough K1 in their daily diet if they are eating vegetables.

Vitamin K1 also converts to Vitamin K2 in the intestinal tract but only if sufficient amounts of vegetables and the proper intestinal bacteria are present. The

Over 40 million Americans have some form of degenerative joint disease, including 80% of people over 50 years old. By the seventh decade, OA is nearly universal, producing the highest rate of morbidity of any disease. Joints affected by OA suffer from uneven loading, which leads to altered lines of weight bearing. Cartilage (made by cells called chondrocytes) begins to build up to compensate for the uneven load, which forms roughening and deformities in the joint surface. The

Prescribed in 14 countries, including Germany, Italy and Russia, S-adenosylmethionine (SAM-e) is a genuine nutrition breakthrough with the capability to rapidly change lives. Before introduction into the U.S., SAM-e was studied on thousands of European patients in dozens of multi-center, double-blind and placebo-controlled clinical trials. These clinical trials demonstrated that SAM-e's biological effects could benefit over 50 million Americans in need of

Ipriflavone, an isoflavone from soy, works like other flavonoids to protect bone

Isoflavones resemble the structure of estrogen and share its effect of slowing bone loss. The isoflavone ipriflavone has been the subject of several studies which suggest that it inhibits bone resorption, thus preventing bone loss associated with the onset of menopause in women. This effect is similar to that of estrogen but with one difference, ipriflavone

Osteoporosis can lead to vertebral fractures and deformities as well as height loss.

During the mid-1980s a word association test would probably have proceeded like this: osteoporosis: bones; bones: calcium; calcium: milk or Tums™. Calcium was the micronutrient additive of choice, and female consumers were bombarded with advertisements for calcium-enriched orange juice, food bars and other beverages. At the same

Life spans have increased drastically during this century, but longevity is a mixed blessing if pain and disability haunt the latter years. Bone fractures are high on the list of serious health problems that plague the elderly, yet research indicates it doesn't have to be that way.

Many elderly people are deficient in vitamin D and calcium, both critical to maintaining strong bones. There are many reasons for age-related deficiencies, the