Absence of evidence for a role of calcitonin in the etiology of femoral neck fracture.

Twenty elderly women with fracture of the femoral neck were compared with 10 age-matched women undergoing elective hip surgery. In spite of an equivalent calcium response to intravenous calcium, neither basal nor stimulated calcitonin levels were significantly different between the groups. Parathormone, 25OHD, and 1,25(OHD)2 showed no significant differences between the femoral neck fracture group and control subjects. It is thus unlikely that calcitonin has an important role in the etiology of postmenopausal osteoporosis associated with femoral neck fracture.