A study conducted by University of California has pointed to the fact that patients who are taking proton pump inhibitors and histamine 2 receptor antagonists are at higher risk of developing hip fractures as compared to the patients who are not on the medications.
This was found in the study which involved 34000 patients with hip fractures taking proton-pump inhibitors and histamine-2 receptor antagonists shows that the risk for hip fracture is approximately 30% higher than in matched controls not taking these medications.
This study was recently announced at Digestive Disease Week 2009.
The study was done by Douglas A. Corley, assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco (UCSF) and staff gastroenterologist at Kaiser Permanente in San Francisco along with their colleagues. The study consisted of analysis of Kaiser Permanente database.
The researchers found that patients with hip fractures were 30% more likely to have taken proton pump inhibitors for for at least 2 years and risk for hip fracture was 18% higher in those taking 2 or more years.
The longer duration increases the risk. Higher dosage did that too but a real dose response was not found.
Most affected group was that of patients between 50 to 59 years of age.
But the researchers also agree that the findings could be coincidental or confounded in spite of controls.
Proton pump inhibitors and H2 antagonists a are effective medications for gastritis, gastric ulcer and reflux disease. The omeprazole, pantoprazole and ranitidine are few of the common names. Oftentimes, once a patient is prescribed them, they are almost always on them forever.
Therefore physicians are advised to be cautious of not overprescribing them.
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