Bone metabolism markers in collegiate female runners

Background: Overuse osteopathy including stress fracture is a serious problem for female runners.Research question:The purpose of this study was to investigate the bone metabolism markers in female collegiate track and field athletes with/without overuse osteopathy and sedentary control. Type of study: Cross-sectional study. Methods:Subject sincluded 25 female collegiate track and field athletes (stress fracture subjects, n=12,no-stress fracturesubjects, n=13).In addition, 16 women without exercise experiencewere included as a control group. The measured elements were bone strengthby quantitative ultra sounds (QUS), bone metabolism markers (serum bone-specific alkaline phosphatase [BAP], circulating serum cross-linked N-telopeptide [NTx], urinary NTx,and tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase [TRAP]-5b), and estradiol. Results:Inthe resulting analysis, both stress fractureandno-stress fracture groups showed significantly higher QUS valuesthan the non-exercising control group (p<0.001). Moreover, both athlete groupsexhibited significantly higher TRAP-5b levels than the control group (p<0.05). However, BAP, blood NTx, urinary NTx, and estradiollevels showed no significant differences between the threegroups. Conclusion: These findings suggest that TRAP-5b isa useful marker to monitorbone metabolism in the track and field athletes.