J Korean Acad Fam Med.  2002 Apr;23(4):475-484.

Changes of bone mineral density after 2-yrs treatment with HRT and alendronate in osteoporotic Korean women

• Oh HJ
• Kim SM
• Cho DH
• Yoon HK
• Han IK

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Alendronate is one of the anti-resorptive drugs for the treatment of osteoporosis and results in a decrease of bone turnover. HRT is also known to decrease the bone turnover. Combination therapy with HRT and alendronate has made significant increase of BMD in postmenopausal women. But there were no available long-term results about combination therapy of HRT and alendronate on Korean osteoporotic women.
METHODS
Eighty postmenopausal women with osteoporosis who visited the Climacteric clinic in Samsung Cheil Hospital & Women's Health Care Center from Apil to July 1999 were subjects. Randomized open labeled case control study was made. We evaluated 37 postmenopausal osteoporotic Korean women who were treated for 2 years after enrollment. Subjects in Group I were treated with HRT only, and group II had HRT with alendronate 10 mg daily. Subjects also were measured BMD at lumbar spine and markers of bone turnover before, one and two year after treatment.
RESULTS
Common reasons for dropouts were side effects of HRT such as breast tenderness, irregular vaginal bleeding, economic problems, long distance from clinic etc. BMD in lumbar spine was increased 10.1% in the first year, and 12.0% in the second year in subjects treated with HRT and alendronate. But in HRT only group BMD increased to 6.4% in the first year and 7.8% at second year. Markers of bone turnover were decreased significantly in both groups compared with baseline value, but the percent changes of markers after 1 year and 2 years between the two groups were not significant.
CONCLUSION
This study demonstrated that, in postmenopausal Korean women with osteoporosis, 2 years of combination therapy with HRT and alendronate resulted in a significant and sustained increase in spinal BMD than HRT only group.

Keyword

postmenopause; osteoporosis; Korean women; alendronate; HRT; bone marker

MeSH Terms

Alendronate*
Bone Density*
Breast
Case-Control Studies
Climacteric
Female
Humans
Osteoporosis
Patient Dropouts
Postmenopause
Spine
Uterine Hemorrhage
Women's Health
Alendronate