KUOPIO, Finland—Vitamin D and calcium supplementation at high daily doses failed to achieve a statistically significant reduction of incident fracture risk in elderly women, according to researchers from University of Kuopio and Kuopio University Hospital. Including 3,432 Finnish women aged 65 and up, who received 800 IU cholecalciferol (vitamin D3) and 1,000 mg calcium (as calcium carbonate) daily or a non-placebo control for three years, focused on incident fractures using data collected via telephone interviews and validated.
Risk of any fracture decreased in the vitamin D and calcium group by 17 percent and the risk of any nonvertebral fracture by 13 percent. The risk of distal forearm fractures decreased by 30 percent, the risk of any upper extremity fractures decreased by 25 percent, and the risk of lower extremity fractures remained essentially equal.
In their report, published online ahead of print in the Journal of Bone Mineral Research, they concluded none of these effects reached statistical significance, stating the study “did not produce statistically significant evidence that vitamin D and calcium supplementation prevents fractures in a 65- to 71-year-old general population of postmenopausal women.”
