Osteopenia–Osteoporosis Syndrome in Patients with Thalassemia: Understanding of Type of Bone Disease and Response to Treatment

With increased life expectancy, thalassaemic bone disease including osteopenia osteoporosis syndrome (OOS) is a major cause of bone pain and fragility fractures especially of the lumbar spine, which may be found in 70-80% adult patients with beta-thalassaemia worldwide, accounting for significant bone morbidity. The causes of OOS in thalassaemia syndromes are multifactorial, and the exact treatment is far from ideal. We undertook a prospective study of 34 thalassaemic patients to evaluate the effect of pamidronate and hormone replacement therapy (if hypogonadal) on bone quantity by DXA scan quality by histomorphometry of bone biopsy and bone dynamics by biochemical markers of bone turnover.Our results show that all patients had osteopenia with abnormal bones on histomorphometry before commencement of treatment. Thalassaemia major patients had high turnover bone disease and all responded favourably to treatment whereas intermedia patients had low turnover bone disease and responded poorly to treatment. Our data also showed that ICTP and PICP is a discriminatory test but histomorphometry is the only test for characterisation of bone morphology.