The aluminum content of bone increases with age, but is not higher in hip fracture cases with and without dementia compared to controls

Aluminum is considered a potentially toxic metal, and aluminum poisoning may lead to three types of disorders: aluminum-induced bone disease, microcytic anemia and encephalopathy. This is well known in patients with chronic renal failure, but since healthy subjects with normal renal function retain 4% of the aluminum consumed, they are also at risk of long-term low-grade aluminum intoxication. Included in this study were a total of 172 patients (age range 16–98 years) with the aim of examining whether aluminum accumulates in bone with increasing age. Additionally, we aimed to investigate whether the aluminum content of bone differs between controls and hip fracture cases with and without dementia, in particular in those with Alzheimer’s disease. During operations for all cases, bone biopsies were taken with an aluminum-free instrument from the trabecular bone. The samples were measured for their content of aluminum using an inductively coupled mass spectrometer. We found an exponential increase in aluminum content of bone with age. The average aluminum values, adjusted for age, were similar in men and women (P=0.46). No significant differences in sex- and age-adjusted mean aluminum values between the controls and the hip fracture cases with (P=0.72) and without (P=0.33) dementia could be detected. The average aluminum concentration among cases with Alzheimer’s disease was also similar to the values of hip fracture patients with other types of dementia (P=0.47). Odds ratios of hip fracture for each quartile of aluminum content in bone were also estimated to detect non-linear effects, but we did not find any statistically significant association remaining after age and sex adjustment. Thus, our results indicate that we accumulate aluminum in bone over our life span, but this does not seem to be of major pathogenetic significance for the occurrence of hip fracture or dementia.