DUAL-ENERGY X-RAY ABSORPTIOMETRY AT THE LUMBAR SPINE IN GERMAN MEN AND WOMEN - A CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY

A cross-sectional, population-based study of 238 randomly selected fem ales and 224 males with German ethnic background (aged 20-80 years) wa s carried out to establish lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) val ues, using dual X-ray absorptiometry (DXA), for a German population. C omparison was made to the reference range provided by the manufacturer of the DXA equipment. No sex difference in peak spine BMD was found i n our study (1.091 +/- 0.114 g/cm2 for males versus 1.070 +/- 0.113 g/ cm2 for females, n.s.). Different patterns of bone loss could be detec ted in both sexes. In premenopausal women there was no significant cor relation between age and BMD (y = 1.044 + 0.00047x, r = 0.03, P = 0.73 ) whereas reduction of female BMD at the spine was demonstrated in pos tmenopausal women (y = 1.189-0.0041x, r = -0.28, P = 0.01), underscori ng the important role of the menopause for later manifestation of spin al osteoporosis in women. In contrast, in males we found no significan t change of BMD with aging (y = 1.071-0,0007x, r = -0.08, P = 0.25). E mploying commonly used exclusion criteria, BMD values of the study sub jects were found mostly within the normal range of BMD. The major find ing of our study was good concordance between female data of our study population and the reference data provided by the manufacturer. Clini cally significant discrepancies between our data and the Hologic refer ence range for males could be detected. Our data on males 130-39 years of age) were up to 7% lower than those provided by the manufacturer, probably due to differences in sampling procedures.