The clinical relevance of calcaneus bone mineral measurements: a review.

The use of bone mineral content (BMC) measurements to assist in the management of osteoporosis has received increasing emphasis in recent years. Although the calcaneus, an essentially trabecular bone (90-95%), has been used extensively in the NASA experiments, few data relating to primary osteoporosis have appeared in the literature until recently. This paper is a review of the methods of measurement, their precision and methods of calibration, and the relationship of calcaneal mineral content to age, height, weight, other bone sites, degree of spinal osteoporosis, metabolic bone disease and the effects of therapeutic drugs. Prospectively, calcaneal BMC relates as well as spinal BMC to osteoporotic fracture risk. It is this use of BMC measurements which has the most promise for the future. The data indicate that osteoporosis is a systemic disease and trabecular bone losses are reflected in the calcaneus as well as in the spine itself.