Advocating For Bone Health, How Can Women Do This?

Dr. Siris explains how women can advocate for their bone health.

Dr. Siris:
The Surgeon General of the United States issued a report a couple of years ago that said America’s bone health is not very good. That’s a bad message. We have the ability to make it much better but that there’s a gap between what we know we should be doing and what we’re actually doing. Women need to help close that gap.

When a woman is in her early 50s and has had menopause, there needs to be a conversation with her doctor about her bone health. So far in the United States, primary care physicians have not exactly taken up the banner to evaluate women. They know they should but they’re so busy dealing with so many issues that it’s going to be necessary for woman to say, “Okay, let’s take a few minutes, I want to talk about my bone health. I want to know if I have risk factors. I want to know if I should do a bone density test now that I am post-menopausal. I need to talk about calcium and vitamin D.”

I think if women bring it to their physicians the physicians will respond and the right advice will then be given. So women have to take up the flag and start asking those bone health questions of their physicians.

About Dr. Ethel Siris, M.D.:
Dr. Ethel S. Siris is the Director at the Toni Stabile Osteoporosis Center, Columbia University, is the Madeline C. Stabile Professor of Medicine at Columbia University, and is the immediate past-President for the National Osteoporosis Foundation. She is board certified in endocrinology and internal medicine, focusing on osteoporosis, metabolic bone disease, and bone and mineral metabolism.

Visit Dr. Siris at New York-Presbyterian Hospital