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I was disagnosed with Osteoporosis about 1 year ago and given a prescription for Boniva. I have stopped taking it because I'm concerned about the side effects of these types of drugs. I would like to try Strontium. Has anyone taken it and had improvements in bone scans? If so, what brand of strontium supplement are you using? Thanks for the help.
Pneumonia Boniva Doxycycline Fractures Osteoporosis Ciprofloxacin Fosamax
Hi Johnnysgirl, i've been taking strontium for going on three years. I had a DEXA after 9 months did show improvements. I'm due to have another one at the end of June and hope to see even better gains. I take NSI strontium citrate that i order online. There are several good brands, but that is the one i've been taking. It's reasonably priced and from the first DEXA it seems to be doing the job. I've experienced no side effects in the time i've been taking it. An added bonus seems to be better teeth...i've only had one small cavity since starting it. take care...phyllis
MY bone scan has shown improvement after being on strontium citrate regularly from Swanson's Vitamins for about a year or so. I was on Fosamax for four years. Yuck.
Hi! johnnysgirl,
Be careful about the strontium supplement you choose. They are not all the same. The optimum dose is 680 mg elemental strontium daily. One study found that three out of five products tested contained significantly less strontium than their labels indicated. The two properly labeled products were AOR Strontium Support and Strontium Bone Maker. The information from the study came from
http://www.starbulletin.com/specialprojects/09/yah/20090326_supplement_help s_bones_grow_stronger.html.
I do not know which three brands tested did not measure up. I have been taking Doctor's Best Strontium Bone Maker for 15 1/2 months and will have a repeat DEXA scan soon. I buy it online from vitasprings.com. It is also available online from drbvitamins.com. My local health food store carries it but at a higher cost.
If phylwill1152 and BobWallace got good results with NSI strontium citrate and Swanson's Vitamins strontium citrate, respectively, then these must be good brands also.
Best of luck to you.
BoneLady
Hi johnnsgirl,
I think it is prudent to stick with the brands Bonelady suggests, though I have learned that Pure Encapsulations is a contender too. I take Doctor's Best myself. Also, I wrote to both Doctor's Best and Pure encapsulations, because I wanted to have written confirmation about the exact make-up of their strontium citrate. Both companies faxed me their spec sheets, (data analysis by an independent lab--all three companies do batch testing) and their strontium is not sourced from China, and meets the standards for purity (some supplements may contain more lead and heavy metals than allowed by the very strict standard set by a proposition in California) as well as the standard for containing the amout of strontium citrate stated on the label. So my rec would be to go with one of these three brands. Doctor's Best I have found to be the cheapest, and Pure encapsulations is, depending on where and when you buy it, at least one third more costly than D Best.
good luck to you
zeta
hey bone lady, great info from the star bulletin. how did you find that information?? linda
Strontium is very good for osteo, but keep in mind that if you have to take antibiotics, you need to stop strontium at least two weeks before you take certain kinds of antibiotics because it can cause adverse side efect if taken with antibiotics. But yes, strontium is excellent.
That's scary to hear about the antibiotics, since you never know when you might need to take them. 2 weeks could be life or death for some. (Thinking about my pneumonia last year.)
My doctor sells the Pure Encapsulated version. $16/90 capsules, no tax. Good price?
Recently had the urine test done and I'm not losing calcium.
Strontium can interfere with the absorption of the tetracycline antibiotics and thus render them pretty useless. I have not seen info that it can effect the other classes of antibiotics though. That would be a good question for the doc. Just like some antibiotics can be taken with milk and others can't I doubt it affects all antibiotics.
I suspect non tetracycline type of antibiotics may be fine to use with strontium but I would ask to be sure
Just wanted to remind folks that I've heard that the technician needs to adjust the Bone Density scan results to take into account the Strontium intake - otherwise you can can get results that appear improved, but are not. There's more info on the website of the company that makes Strontium Ranelate.
linnyd531:
You asked how the info from the star bulletin was found.
Google News has free news alerts that you can sign up for (Yahoo News has the same service). Once a day, I get a digest e-mail message with links to all the day's news stories containing the word "osteoporosis" (you can request such news alerts for any words you wish, like "strontium citrate"). A link to the article from the star bulletin was in one such news digest, which is how I found it.
Nancy08, Gatekeeper, & drizzit,
Strontium may reduce the absorption of tetracycline antibiotics (e.g., tetracycline, minocycline, doxycycline) and quinolone antibiotics (e.g., ciprofloxacin, norfloxacin, nalidixic acid) from the gut and could make them less effective.
If you are prescribed a course of one of these types of antibiotics you should stop taking strontium during the course of antibiotics.
This information is from www.netdoctor.co.uk/medicines/100000762.html
BoneLady
Hi! zeta,
That was an excellent post and great detective work on those two companies. I think I'll request the spec sheet for Strontium Bone Maker from Doctor's Best, also.
BoneLady
Hi! linnyd531 & PikaB,
On March 29, 2009, ccbc started an NOF discussion titled, "Strontium citrate--where to buy??" PikaB posted the link to the starbulletin article about strontium supplements. That is where I saw it. His suggestion about signing up for free news alerts on osteoporosis from Google News and Yahoo News was excellent.
BoneLady
Lynney,
There have been previous NOF discussions on strontium and DEXA scans. If you click on my name, you will see a journal entry from Nov. 19, 2008, titled "Effect of Strontium on DEXA Scans.
On March 12, 2009, I started a discussion on "Strontium and DEXA Scans." Under Favorite links, you will see "Strontium For Bones." You can click on any of these links from my profile page.
Technicians in the U.S.A. do not make corrections to DEXA scan results. If a correction is made, an unlikely scenario in this country, it is made by a radiologist or the patient's physician. It is simply a mathematical formula applied to the results. However, the uncorrected values are relevant because Servier believes it has found significant correlation between improvements in uncorrected scores and decreased risk of fractures.
The manufacturer of strontium ranelate is Servier. Their website contains much information: www.servier.com.
BoneLady
Would clindamycin fall into either of these categories for antibiotics? I am on my fourth round of antibiotics since I had that wisdom tooth extracted exactly two months ago. I'm curious if I should stop taking the strontium for the next 10 days.
Thanks,
Peggy
Peggy,
Clindamycin is a lincosamide antibiotic. Lincomycin is also in this class. Lincosamides are similar in action to macrolides.
So, no, clindamycin is neither a tetracycline nor a quinolone antibiotic.
BoneLady
Hi Phylwill,
When you had your DEXA taken, did you stop taking Strontium for a month or so before the test?
I'm think I'm right here, but if you didn't, you might of got a false reading on your DEXA Scan, which would show your bones are doing better then they really are!
As BoneLady said they cannot ajust the machine for Strontium or anthing. That is what I was told by my Drs. office that takes the tests also.
April
I just started using Strontium Citrate that I got from vitacost.com. I haven't been using it long enough to definitely say how much it is helping but my nails are getting stronger. My friend who told me about this has been taking it for over two years and has had a sizable improvement in her bone scan.
I took Strontium for several months but then noticed I had developed a rash on my torso, front and back. I read that some people are sensitive to it and if you develop a rash you should discontinue taking it. Does anyone have any information about this or experienced a rash also?
Clever_Cleo,
Sorry to hear about the rash. But I would highly recommend that you report this to the company that produces your brand (that caused this).
I seemed to have new hair growth (unwanted), and told Doctor's Best. They said it is important for patients to report as they have on file that there are absolutely no side effects (which they told me prior to my purchase).
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