Medication May Help Fractures Heal
July 18, 2009 by Marijke Durning, RN
Filed under Diseases & Conditions
A study that recruited women from 7 countries has found that women who had fractured a wrist healed more quickly if they received an injection of human parathyroid hormone (PTH), called teriparatide . This medication is used to treat osteoporosis. The results of the study were published in the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research .
Researchers recruited 102 women who were aged between 45 and 85 years. They were post menopausal and had fractured a wrist, called a Colle’s fracture . A Colle’s fracture involves a break of the end of the radius bone of the forearm. All the women were casted, none had surgery to repair the fracture.
The group was divided into three. For eight weeks, one group received a placebo (sugar pill), one received 20 micrograms of PTH and the last group received 40 micrograms.
The results showed that there wasn’t much difference between the 40 microgram and the 20 microgram groups in healing time, but the 20 microgram group healed at an average of 7.4 weeks, while it took an average of 9.1 weeks for the placebo group to heal.
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