Osteoporosis is a condition where a persons bones are at a heightened risk of being fractured or broken due to a decrease in their bone density making the bones become thin and weak.
The bones in your body are constantly under a natural process of being renewed and replaced. This is controlled by two processes; one process slowly breaks down old bone (cells called Osteoclasts break down bone, this is done so that new bone can be laid down) and the other process lays down new bone (this is done by cells called Osteoblasts). These processes work together and are in balance so don't affect your bone density. As people age however, the process which breaks down and absorbs the bone works slightly faster than the process which builds and renews the bone. Over time this slowly decreases your bone density.
There are other factors however that increase the rate at which your bone density decreases and this leads to Osteoporosis.
Studies are starting to find that there is a link between the acidity of our body and Osteoporosis. To function at an optimum, our bodies need to be slightly alkaline. If our bodies become too acidic then things start to go wrong.
Bone is very sensitive to even small changes in the bodies pH (level of acidity). If your body starts to become acidic it causes the Osteoclasts (cells that break bone down) to increase their activity, it inhibits the activity of Osteoblasts (cells that build new bone) and minerals stored in our bones are lost. This all leads to an increased loss of bone density.
If our bodies acidity starts to increase, our body gives up calcium and other minerals from our bone stores to balance the acidity. The body does this to stay healthy. To balance the acidity, our body takes minerals from our bones thus reducing its density and increasing the chance of suffering from Osteoporosis.
One of the ways in which our bodies become acidic is through our diet. Most people don't eat enough healthy food, instead people replace healthy food with convenient nutrient poor food.
The good news is that there are ways in which you can help prevent decreases in bone density. I have listed below 5 ways to help you prevent your bone density decreasing.
1) Diet- You need to eat a diet with the necessary vitamins and minerals which aid in increasing bone density and stay away from foods that increase your bodies pH. eg; white sugar.
2) Exercise- Do consistent weight bearing exercise. This puts a load on the bones and stimulates them to strengthen to cope with the exercise.
3) Calcium, Vitamin D and Magnesium supplements- Calcium is one of the building blocks of bone giving them their strength, Vitamin D helps the body absorb calcium from our diet and if our bodies don't have enough magnesium then this accelerates bone loss.
4) Don't smoke
5) Keep alcohol consumption to a minimum
Osteoporosis is a health condition that affects many people world wide but the good news is that there are ways to help reduce and minimize the effects.
Darryl has a degree in Anatomy and a keen interest in health. For more information on how to prevent Osteoporosis and to find out if Osteoporosis can be reversed Visit: http://preventosteoporosis.blogspot.com/
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