WEDNESDAY, May 7 (HealthDay News) -- Want your teenage daughter
to have strong bones? Steer her to soccer or other impact sports,
experts suggest, and you may help her prevent low bone density
later in life.
Sports such as soccer -- with the combination of weight-bearing
exercise and repetitive, "impact-loading" from jumping and running
-- have been shown to build bone mineral density in adolescent
girls better than some other activities.
Building bone density during the teen years is considered
crucial for healthy bone development, helping to ward off
osteoporosis, the disease that causes bones to become brittle and
break later on in life. Peak bone mass is typically achieved by age
30, according to the National Osteoporosis Foundation.
"It's those years of adolescence, and early teens to late 20s,
that are most important" for bone building," said James W. Bellew,
an associate professor of physical therapy at Louisiana State
University Health Science Center-Shreveport.
Bellew and his colleagues compared the effects of soccer,
weight-lifting and swimming on the bone mineral density of teen and
pre-teen girls, ages 10 to 17. The groups included 29 swimmers, 16
soccer players and 19 weightlifters.
Soccer players had the best bone density, followed by the
weight-lifters and then the swimmers. Bellew's team compared the
groups' average bone mineral density to what is considered the norm
for a 25-year-old woman.
Soccer players' bone density was significantly greater than the
norm, and the weight-lifting group was equal to the norm. The
swimmers were lower than the norm. Still, that's not cause for
alarm, he said, because the girls were still in their teens and
have time to accrue bone density.
Soccer and other "impact" sports expose the body to repeated
impact, and that activity is thought helpful to bone health.
"Basketball and volleyball may very well do the same" as soccer in
building bone, he said. Jogging and tennis may also be good, he
added.
The study results, published in the journal
Pediatric Physical Therapy, don't surprise Susan Randall,
senior director of education at the National Osteoporosis
Foundation. "Swimming is not a weight-bearing exercise," she said.
"Soccer increases the loading on the bone which actually stimulates
bone production."
Bellew isn't discouraging those who love swimming to give up the
sport. "The odds are the swimmers' density [in the study] will be
fine, because they are active, but our data suggest they aren't
accruing as much bone as those who do weight-bearing exercise."
"If your primary objective is to increase bone mass, swimming is
not the best," he said. "But in terms of weight maintenance, it's
good."
Besides exercise, Bellew suggests teens can boost their bone
health by reducing their soda intake and increasing their milk
consumption. "Genetics is probably the largest factor," he added,
so those with a family history of osteoporosis may want to pay even
more attention to bone-building exercise.
Randall agreed that families should pay even closer attention to
their children if a parent or grandparent suffers from low bone
density. And parents can emphasize a healthy diet for their sons as
well as daughters. While men are less likely than women to suffer
osteoporosis, they still need to build bone, she said.
One of the first foods teen girls often abandon are dairy
products, Randall said, because they perceive them as fattening.
Parents should be sure their children get the recommended 1,300
milligrams of calcium a day. That's roughly the amount of calcium
in four glasses of milk. And the milk can be low-fat, she said.
More information
To learn more about bone health, visit the
National Osteoporosis
Foundation.
