As physios we often hear of bone myths that can be confusing or misleading. Want to understand your bones?
Bones Myths – We hear a lot of Bone Myths which can get confusing, and even misleading. Lets go through some common questions about bones and their healing!
A fracture is different to a broken bone – FALSE. “Fracture” is just another way to describe a “broken bone” or “break”. A “green-stick fracture” on the other hand is a specific type of fracture common in children where the bone doesn’t break completely due to the “bendy” nature of growing bones; young healthy bones are not as brittle as older bones tend to be (but you can do things to make them less brittle!).
All bones take the same time to heal – FALSE. Bones all have the same healing pathway (inflammation; soft callus formation; hard callus formation; re-modelling). In children, bone healing takes approximately 4-6 weeks, but in adults it tends to take 6-16… BUT depending on certain factors such as where the bone is broken, how good blood flow to the bone is, whether the break was in a joint, whether there was effective immobilisation after a break (cast/ splint/ moon boot), and other complications to the injury, healing may take longer. Also, the final stage of bone healing (re-modelling) actually happens over several years after the break!
If you break a bone it heals stronger – FALSE. Bones go through phases of healing – first the bone has to knit itself back together; once this happens bone will initially be WEAKER than other bones; when a bone is fully healed it will be just as strong as other bones but not stronger.
Babies have more bones than adults – TRUE. As babies we have lots of little bones and all our bone growth plates. Over time these form together and fuse to make our strong adult bones and as a result we have fewer once we are fully grown.
Impact makes bones stronger – TRUE but not in the way you might think. Studies have found that repetitive impact increases bone mineral density. If a bone has a higher bone mineral density this means that it is less porous and is less likely to break – aka stronger! Impact that was tested in these studies included hopping, jumping and skipping exercise – which all have a gravitational component; so it may not apply to impact such as in NRL and martial art sports… so don’t go hitting things to make your bones stronger! Power and resistance training studies have also shown improvement in bone density; have a look at this month’s exercises to get started!
Calcium from milk makes your bones strong – HALF TRUE. Calcium is just one of the many nutrients required to keep your bones strong. This is not just for children or if you have a fracture but in fact during your whole life your bone is continually breaking down and repairing itself to stay healthy! As we get older what happens is the breaking down increases and the repairing decreases which is why older people can develop osteopenia and osteoporosis. To encourage the balance of breakdown and repair good nutrition encourages healthy bone building! Have a look at this month’s diet information for more detail on what vitamins are key to bone health!
Reference Sources: Allison, S. J., Folland, J. P., Rennie, W. J., Summers, G. D., & Brooke-Wavell, K. (2013). High impact exercise increased femoral neck bone mineral density in older men: a randomised unilateral intervention. Bone, 53(2), 321-328. || Bailey, C. A., & Brooke-Wavell, K. (2010). Optimum frequency of exercise for bone health: randomised controlled trial of a high-impact unilateral intervention. Bone, 46(4), 1043-1049. || Bettis, T., Kim, B., J., & Hamrick, M., W. (2018). Impact of muscle atrophy on bone metabolism and bone strength: implications for muscle-bone crosstalk with aging and disuse. Osteoporosis International, 1-8. doi: 10.1007/s00198-018-4570-1 || Duplanty, A. A., Levitt, D. E., Hill, D. W., McFarlin, B. K., Dimarco, N. M., & Vingren, J. L. (2018). Resistance training is associated with higher bone mineral density among young adult male distance runners independent of physiological factors. The Journal of Strength & Conditioning Research, 32(6), 1594-1600. doi: 10.1519/JSC.0000000000002504 || Giganti, M. G., Tresoldi, I., Masuelli, L., Modesti, A., Grosso, G., Liuni, F. M., Celi, M., Rao, C., Gasbarra, E., Bei, R., & Tarantino, U. (2014). Fracture healing: from basic science to role of nutrition. Front Biosci (Landmark Ed), 19, 1162-1175. || Karpouzos, A., Diamantis, E., Farmaki, P., Savvanis, S., & Troupis, T. (2017) Nutritional Aspects of Bone Health and Fracture Healing. Journal of Osteoporosis, 2017 (4218472). doi: 10.1155/2017/4218472 || Laurent, M., R. (2018). Bone: best papers of the year 2017. Archives of Osteoporosis, 13 (29). doi:10.1007/s11657-018-0437-5 || Von Stengel, S., Kemmler, W., Kalender, W. A., Engelke, K., & Lauber, D. (2007). Differential effects of strength versus power training on bone mineral density in postmenopausal women: a 2-year longitudinal study. British journal of sports medicine, 41(10), 649-655