Prevalence of osteoporosis in men aged 65–75 in a primary care setting. A practice audit after application of the Canadian 2010 guidelines for osteoporosis screening

Current Canadian osteoporosis guidelines recommend routine bone density screening of men at age 65. The purpose of this study is to determine the prevalence of osteoporosis in men aged 65–75 in after application of screening guidelines. All males aged 65–75 years who attended a large primary care clinic were advised of the 2010 Canadian osteoporosis guidelines and advised to obtain a bone density scan at or after their 65th birthday. Those who did not have a bone density scan since their 65th birthday were advised to obtain a scan, unless there was obvious reason not to do so (i.e. known osteoporosis). A record of the results for each patient were kept and tallied to determine the prevalence of osteoporosis. Osteoporosis was defined as a T-score of ≤ −2.5 in either the hip or lumbar spine. Of 574 male subjects in this clinic, between the ages of 65-75, 557 had a bone density scan, either already having done so at the time of being informed of the guidelines or obtaining a scan in the subsequent year after being informed of the guidelines. The prevalence of osteoporosis was 1.6 % (9/557, 95 % confidence interval 0.8–3.1 %) in this sample. The average age of subjects with osteoporosis was 70.5 ± 1.4 years (range 68–75). None of the subjects under 68 years of age were found to have osteoporosis. The prevalence of osteoporosis in unselected male cohorts aged 65 may be too low to justify the routine bone density screening recommended in the 2010 Canadian osteoporosis guidelines.