No, Calcium Won’t Improve Bone Density

If you’re over 50 and thinking about taking calcium supplements to improve bone density, think again. Two recent large-scale studies attempted to find exactly how helpful calcium could be, when taken either in dietary or supplemental form, and the answer turned out to be….not very helpful. Nicholas Bakalar reports in the New York Times that one of the trials, which included 13,790 men and women over 50, “showed that more calcium in the diet or taken as supplements increased bone density about 1 percent to 2 percent — too little to have any effect on fractures.”  The other trial, which analyzed the results of 55 studies, found that calcium failed to reduce the number of broken bones, with the possible exception of a slightly reduced risk of vertebral fracture. Bakalar writes: “ The four most rigorous, randomized controlled trials of calcium supplements included more than 45,000 participants and showed no association between supplements and the risk of fracture at any site.”