Prevalence of low forearm bone mineral density in Bulgarian men: a pilot study

Objective. To determine the prevalence of osteoporosis at the distal forearm in a male cohort referred for bone density testing and to compare it to published data of Bulgarian women. Design and subjects. 315 consecutive Bulgarian men aged 20 to 84 years were included (mean age 53.74 +/- 14.67 years). 59% of them were self-referrals. The comparative female group consisted of 8869 Bulgarian women whose forearm bone mineral density (BMD) was measured in another study. Measurements. BMD was measured by single X-ray absorptiometry at the distal forearm (distal and ultradistal sites) in all men. T-scores were calculated from manufacturer-provided Danish male reference data. Results. The ratio of female to male patients was 28.2 (8869 to 315). Peak BMD was observed in men aged 30 to 39 years: 0.560 +/- 0.065 g/cm(2) (distal site) and 0.490 +/- 0.070 g/cm(2) (ultradistal site). A steady BMD decline followed reaching 0.492 +/- 0.064 g/cm(2) at the distal and 0.412 +/- 0.069 g/cm(2) at the ultradistal site in age group > 70. Age had a rather weak negative impact on forearm BMD described by a linear model. In men aged over 50 years the prevalence of osteoporosis at the distal site was 21.19%, compared to 20.45% in women. Low bone mass was seen in 48.77% of men and 32.50% of women. Normal BMD was more frequent in women (47.05%) than in men (30.04%). Conclusions. We found a high prevalence of forearm osteoporosis in Bulgarian men which is comparable to that already known in women.