Retaining Bone Health

Scott: Can you talk about how big of a problem bone loss is? Or even osteoporosis? At least in this country, and probably around the world, as people age.

Sam Possimiers, PhD: Osteoporosis is, of course, as you know, it's a worldwide problem. It's in any society and civilization. As people get older, there is an issue, mainly with women, but also an underestimated problem in men. That's, as you age, there is a problem with osteoporosis. The exact figures depend from society to society, but numbers are as high as 50% or more, that you have weakened bone structure. This does not develop in each individual into actual osteoporosis, but increased risk of fractures is a general problem associated with aging. This means that the problem is very important, and finding a solution which works in a natural way is a very, very important aspect.

Scott: You said that as we get older, the bone loss increases, and the remaking of bone decreases. If we do things right, can we reverse that trend and not have our bones be so brittle? Can we go from bad to an improved situation? 

Sam Possimiers, PhD: Yes. In fact, what you see is that you have this imbalance. Now, there are two ways of approaching this. You could say, I want to restore this balance, and you can actually help the body to restore this balance. You can have two approaches. You can either say, I just inactivated absorption, so I stopped the removal of the old bone. And the consequence, of course, is no degradation anymore, so you don't have further bone loss. 

Scott: Okay

Sam Possimiers, PhD: This is the typical approach, which is followed with bisphosphonates, with the typical drugs which target osteoporosis. Results are good. We see that people really develop more bone again, because there is no removal and there is formation. And you can actually strengthen your bones again. 

Now, the main issue with this classical approach is, as I mentioned before, that bone formation and bone metabolism is a dynamic process. You have to be able to remove old, lower quality bones, and restore that and replace that with new bones. If you just stop the degradation process, you in fact stop or block this natural renewal of bones. 

The alternative strategy that you could follow is, instead of stopping the removal, if you manage to support the body in increasing the bone formation, you can actually in a very natural and very dynamic way restore the normal balance in bone formation and bone absorption. This is actually something you can do, and something that we showed also in a 12-month clinical trial.