It seems like every day we hear
another story of an elderly person fracturing a hip. But today, it looks like this statistic is
actually declining. The study came from
epidemiologists assessing a government survey of patients who had been
hospitalized between 1990 and 2006. The
study found noteworthy decreases among men over 85 and women over 75. This is extremely positive since what often
happens with hip breaks is that the patient needs to be moved to a nursing home
for at least a year to heal. As well,
such a fracture – if not cared for adequately – can result in many future visits
to the ER.
No one really knows what has caused this decline or if the trend is likely to continue in the future. It could be the fact that there has been improved treatment for osteoporosis but that cannot be proved. It could also be that since older people are generally in better shape, they are not falling as often. “Then there’s the cohort explanation. The older women who broke hips in the early 1990s — 1997 was the year that fracture rates peaked — were young during the Depression.” This might have been due to food shortages and malnutrition which meant they never developed sufficient bone density. This news definitely takes off the pressure from doctors working in the ER like Dr. Josyann Abisaab who works at NY Presbyterian Hospital who can often be somewhat overwhelmed by individuals with breaks who need urgent care.
